Scholarly record

FREE-FORM WOODEN ARCHITECTURAL ENVELOPES IN TERMS OF ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Michal Golanski, Krystyna Januszkiewicz

Abstract

Form-found designs are evolving structures reflecting material and structural behaviors and environmental context by utilizing prevalent winds, radiation, and temperature. The paper applies case study analysis of free-form wooden architectural envelopes designed by Renzo Piano Building Workshop, which improve the energy performance of the buildings. The use of digitally designed and manufactured structural wood can radically reduce the amount of energy consumed by materials used in building during whole life cycle. Buildings consume energy at different levels in every stage of the life-cycle and building materials occupy a great share of this consumption. The use of parametric tools has become important, allowing architects to explore multiple design alternatives in an interactive environment, which permits the designers to evaluate and compare different design solutions and to choose the most efficient one. Form-found structures are more efficient, as competing principles are assimilated and optimized throughout the design process by employing a parametric computational environment and the sustainable concept. There is an inherent flexibility allowing different design options to be explored. The challenge at the present moment is to incorporate material-based design strategies in digital fabrication methods by developing an integrated design approach where material, form, structure and environmental context are inherently linked. The trend of digital freeform design coupled with the awareness of environmental issues have propelled architecture to a higher level by comprehensively merging new technologies and green concepts.

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