
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.
Folding elements have already been used in architecture as either: (a) simple or negligibly thin folds such as tent-like structures; (b) thick panels with single straight hinges; or (c) flat, faceted forms that appear to have been folded. What is seldom seen is folding in more complicated patterns that also use thick panels. The more complicated crease patterns inspired from origami cannot be used interchangeably between thin and thick materials. Further, once a folding feature is designed, it must have a way to attach to the main/super structure and have a means to deploy.
If design parameters and attachments can be better presented and understood, more origami patterns that are rigid and thick may be incorporated into kinetic architecture or rigid-thick origami kinetic architecture. This research by Scott Macri creates a useful primer for understanding and designing rigid-thick origami structures by simplifying and organizing existing knowledge on rigid- thick origami into a more accessible format for designers and architects without the need for deep mathematical background.
It also presents a variety of design patterns which can be altered or adapted along provided guidelines, as well as propose some methods in which to attach and operate some of these designs on a superstructure through documentation of a working prototype. The hope is that more rigid-thick origami concepts will be available to allow for more practical and aesthetic design opportunities in the field of kinetic 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.
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