
The Airshell Prototype
This paper by Alessandro Liuti, Sofia Colabella, and Alberto Pugnale, presents the construction of Airshell, a small timber gridshell prototype erected by employing a pneumatic formwork.
Designing Lightweight Structures from Recyclable and Organic Materials: The Rethinking Lightweight Pavilion
The current development towards bending-active structural design indicates that lightweight structures constantly evolve due to contemporary demands. This paper documents the approach to rethinking lightweight structures to face the growing scarcity of resources.
Since conventional composite materials in lightweight structures have severe limitations in terms of their recyclability, this raises new challenges for designers and engineers in the use of raw materials. In order to reduce the environmental impact, this research investigates the use of fully recyclable materials made from renewable resources in bending-active tensile structures.
Based on an experimental approach, this paper presents an innovative pavilion design which will be exhibited as a built prototype at the IASS WG21 competition. The results of the four-step methodology consisting of parametric design, material testing, numerical simulation and the verification of the results using a mock-up structure are presented and discussed.
The Rethinking Lightweight Pavilion demonstrates that the use of materials suitable for the circular economy can make an inspiring contribution to lightweight structures of the future.
The critical state of our world, our climate, and our environment results largely from our irresponsible use of resources. From an ecological perspective, lightweight structures offer solutions to these problems: By making optimum use of material strength, lightweight structures save material and thus resources. In addition, lightweight structures can often be dismantled and reused.
Historical development shows that lightweight structures can adapt flexibly to social requirements. This is also reflected in the continuation of the traditional principles of lightweight design in the form of the new structural typology of bending-active tensile hybrid structures. Instead of the former avoidance of bending stresses, these become a decisive form-determining structural element.
The consequent demand for high strengths with slender cross-sections has led to increasingly advanced building materials in recent decades. However, the multi-layered, complex composite materials that have been developed have severe limitations in terms of their recyclability. This causes difficulties in the current paradigm shift from a linear to a circular economy.
The aim of this research is to investigate the use of fully recyclable materials in bending-active tensile hybrid structures with special focus on renewable resources. The challenges that arise for structures made of such materials from a structural and mechanical point of view will be determined and approaches to solving them will be addressed.
The new structural typology of bending-active structures developed in the last decade is characterised by the elastic deformation of individual structural elements, which result in the shape and overall stiffness of these structures. By integrating bending-active elements into a form-active structural membrane, a hybrid system is formed, combining the positive characteristics of both structural typologies.
The bending-active elements provide the double curvature and the necessary pre-stress of the membrane, while the membrane in turn maintains the curvature and increases the buckling strength of the rods.
Previous research projects have demonstrated the application of this principle to small-scale and largescale projects. Due to the complex form-finding process of hybrid structures, computer-aided formfinding has also made significant progress. Current research on bending-active tensile hybrid structures focuses on improving the stiffness and robustness of the structures. In addition, the tailoring of material behaviour, e.g. through CNC knitted fabrics, is being explored for smaller installations.
The quality of lightweight structures can not only be evaluated in terms of the strength of the materials used. The environmental impact of the materials applied is significant in the evaluation of how sustainable a design can be implemented.
The research for the Rethinking Lightweight Pavilion demonstrates that filigree-looking structures based on complex form-finding and structural action can also be achieved with loadbearing components made from renewable, entirely organic resources. Rethinking Lightweight can thus make an inspiring contribution to how lightweight structures can continue to develop in terms of a resource-respectful use of materials in the future.
This paper by Alessandro Liuti, Sofia Colabella, and Alberto Pugnale, presents the construction of Airshell, a small timber gridshell prototype erected by employing a pneumatic formwork.
In this paper by Gregory Charles Quinn, Chris J K Williams, and Christoph Gengnagel, a detailed comparison is carried out between established as well as novel erection methods for strained grid shells by means of FE simulations and a 3D-scanned scaled physical model in order to evaluate key performance criteria such as bending stresses during erection and the distance between shell nodes and their spatial target geometry.
In this paper by Frederic Tayeb, Olivier Baverel, Jean-François Caron, Lionel du Peloux, ductility aspects of a light-weight composite gridshell are developed.
In this paper by Julian Lienhard, Holger Alpermann, Christoph Gengnagel and Jan Knippers structures that actively use bending as a self forming process are reviewed.
Parametric Tools for Architects & Designers @2025
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