Course Meetings

• Thursdays: 10h15 – 12h00; 13h15 – 18h00
• Fridays: 08h15 – 12h00; 13h15 – 18h00

Rooms

• AAC1 06 presentations & workshops
• GC F1 10 atelier
• BC0 10 alternate

Instructor

• Jeffrey Huang, jeffrey[dot]huang[at]epfl[dot]ch

Assistants

• Guillaume Labelle, guillaume[dot]labelle[at]epfl[dot]ch
• Julien Nembrini, julien[dot]nembrini[at]epfl[dot]ch
• Trevor Patt, trpatt[at]gmail[dot]com
• Nathaniel Zuelzke, nathaniel[dot]zuelzke[at]epfl[dot]ch

Website

• http://superstudio.epfl.ch
• http://anar.ch

Mailing Lists

• all, selection-all[at]listes[dot]epfl[dot]ch
• only instructors, selection-staff[at]listes[dot]epfl[dot]ch
• ANAR+ questions, forum[at]list[dot]anar[dot]ch

The use of digital tools for architectural production is no longer a question. As the exchange of information approaches real-time and authorship becomes increasingly distributed, revision control, or ‘versioning’, will inevitably become the default means of documentation. The capacity of digital media to iterate form, simulate behavior, and evaluate performance promises to satisfy both the social imperative for pragmatics and the cultural pursuit of innovation.

This studio continues the research of ‘organicity’, the digital generation of architecture using biological paradigms, with a specific aim to promote interaction and collaboration among students, instructors, invited experts, and the public at large. Student work occurs in cycles of intuition, self-assessment, collaboration, and evaluation ranging in duration from a few days to a few weeks. At the completion of each cycle, aspects of the student work are formally ‘selected’ for continued development. The selection will occur both ‘naturally’ by the studio’s socio-academic dynamic and ‘unnaturally’ by imposition of the instructors and invited experts. The further development may be pursued by any member(s) of the studio. In addition, students are required to regularly publish their work via blogs and create visual comments of their peers’ work. Instructors and experts will explicitly contribute visual criticism to the blog community, and the public at large may supply input as well if the community is suitably publicized. In this way, the intention is to create a design ‘ecology’ in which instinctive interactions can occur between fluidly reforming groups in pursuit of common design ideas.

The course will cover organicity in both theory and production, presenting material in workshop, critique, and lecture components. Students will develop a semester-long design project in two complementary phases:

The first phase is dedicated to the acquisition of cultural and technical facility, schematic explorations, and conceptual definition of the design project. Each week will feature an intensive workshop in scripted architecture and a typological design exercise. In addition to the weekly assignments, student groups will present analytical case-studies of self-organization in physical or biological systems. The phase culminates with a mid-term review in which students will present the synthesis of their research as parametric design engines.

In the second phase students use these design engines to develop a detailed architectural proposal for an innovative urban high-rise. Guest lecturers will present materials and run workshops to assist in optimizing the performance of each proposal. Students will present their work in reviews in the middle and at the end of the phase. Final proposals will be submitted to the 2010 eVolo Skyscraper competition.

• 15% attendance & class participation
• 25% presentations
• 60% blog documentation

Attendance of all class hours is strictly expected. Report all absences to the staff by email as early as possible. Multiple unexcused absences may affect your grade in greater proportion than listed above.

Superstudio Platform: An update to the studio infrastructure that facilitates collaboration, organizes files, and integrates web publishing, there are three key elements with which students will interact daily:

1. Frontend - the 'home base' which gives access to course documents, aggregates individual content for the web, and allows centralized interaction;
2. SVN - the file-sharing and version-management backend which makes real-time, distributed collaboration possible; the SVN will come to be a digital library of coded tools and design ideas. (Note that SVN only allows files <1Mb, larger files will be made available through my.epfl.ch students account and appropriately linked);
3. Blogs - the individually curated publication of your research which, with SVN, feeds the frontend; further description follows below.

Individual Blogs: You are required to maintain a blog of your studio experience. This will be the venue for the publication of all deliverables throughout the semester and is therefore the primary work on which you will be graded. As a minimum, you are to publish 3 entries per week:

1. Inspirational material – collect text, hypertext, images, animations, videos &c., explain what is relevant to you, and re-present the material in original graphics;
2. Current design research – specific requirements will be issued with each assignment or brief;
3. Graphic comments – a critical analytical response to one of your peers’ blog posts in original graphics;

Additional posts are encouraged and may reflect upon any aspect of your studio experience.

Fabrication: The immediacy and tangibility of physical models provide essential feedback for digital design. Students are expected to move between physical and virtual media throughout the entire semester. In addition to the prototyping facilities at the Atelier des Maquettes, the lab has a laser-cutter available for your use. For the mid-term review a series of 3D-printed prototypes will be explicitly required. Further prototypes are highly encouraged.

Course Readings: Relevant articles will be collected on the Superstudio platform and selected texts will be assigned throughout the semester. We will also designate a secure area for the sharing of printed materials related to technical aspects of programming, the skyscraper typology, biological inspiration, and digital materiality.

Ad-hoc Workshops: As the course progresses it becomes more difficult to present material that is universally relevant to all members of the studio. The staff will try to accommodate all requests for further instruction on all topics, techniques, or tools with which we are suitably competent.

download the graphic schedule (right-click & save):
selection_schedule.pdf

Thursday AM: Course Introduction (JH), issue x1 Logic of Form: Composition (NZ)
Thursday PM: p0&1 Teaching Platform & LOGO-Procedural (GL,JN)
Friday AM: Introduction to Self-organization (JN, NZ)
Friday PM: blog crits (all)

Thursday AM: x1 due (review: all), issue x2 Logic of Form: Circulation (NZ)
Thursday PM: p2 LOGO-Agents (GL,JN)
Friday AM: cs1 Ant Trails (review: all)
Friday PM: blog crits (all)

Thursday AM: x2 due (review: all), issue x3 Logic of Form: Assembly (NZ)
Thursday PM: p3 LOGO DIY CNC (GL,JN)
Friday AM: cs2 Wasp Nest Building (review: all)
Friday PM: blog crits (all)

Thursday AM: x3 due (review: all), issue x4 Design Engines: Proportion (NZ), present site (TP), issue mid-term requirements (JH)
Thursday PM: p4 ANAR+ Design With Ratios (GL,JN)
Friday AM: cs3 Bacteria Growth(review: all)
Friday PM: blog crits (all)

Thursday AM: x4 due (review: all), issue x5 Design Engines: Program(NZ)
Thursday PM: p5 ANAR+ Flow Control(GL,JN)
Friday AM: Guy Theraulaz lecture, cs4 Sand Dunes(review: all)
Friday PM: blog crits (all)

Thursday AM: x5 due (review: all), issue x6 Design Engines: Ecology(NZ)
Thursday PM: p6 ANAR+ Feedback Systems(GL,JN)
Friday AM: cs5 Termite Mounds(review: all)
Friday PM: blog crits (all)

Thursday AM: x6 due, csTools due (review: all)
Thursday PM: p7 ANAR+ Elegance (GL,JN)
Friday AM: cs6 Crowd Behavior (review: all)
Friday PM: blog crits (all)

Thursday: work day
Friday AM: MID-TERM REVIEW (review: all)
Friday PM: guest lecture, issue pin-up requirements (JH)

Thursday: work day
Friday: blog crits (all)

Thursday: work day
Friday: blog crits (all)

Thursday: work day
Friday AM: PROGRESS PIN-UP (review: all)
Friday PM: guest lecture, issue final requirements (JH)

Thursday: work day
Friday: blog crits (all)

Thursday: work day
Friday: blog crits (all)

Thursday: work day
Friday AM: FINAL REVIEW (review: all)
Friday PM: guest lecture, issue eVolo requirements (JH)

12/01: Registration deadline
18/01: Submission deadline
22/02: Winners' announcement