
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.
In this thesis by Mahmoud Islam Abdelhay Gadelhak a simplified framework and design decision support tool was developed to aid designers and architects in the domain of multidimensional optimization of building facades, where environmental performance measures are enhanced by incrementally improving the façades design using multi-objective optimizations.
The framework facilitates the generation of architectural forms of building envelopes according to different performance aspects such as daylighting, energy efficiency, thermal comfort, visual comfort, energy generation, and life cycle analysis.
It utilizes the flexibility of parametric design and scripting interfaces as front- end input tools (e.g. Python and Grasshopper for Rhinoceros 3D) and simulation software as building performance assessment tools (e.g. Energy Plus, Radiance, and Daysim).
The multi-objective optimization problem can then be solved using evolutionary search techniques such as Pareto Genetic Algorithms. A visualization dashboard is developed to facilitate the visualization and analysis of optimization and simulations results.
Case studies were used to demonstrate the framework’s potential and its usability. The thesis aims to show that this approach is specifically practical for contemporary design practices, as it offers the designers with a decision support tool that is based on a robust method for optimizing performative and constructible free-form architecture.
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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