RETHINKING COMPUTER-AIDED DESIGN DRIVEN ARCHITECTURE TYPOLOGIES: A CLASSIFICATION & REVIEW OF MATERIAL-BASED COMPUTATIONAL DESIGN

Abstract

Computer-Aided Designs (CAD) has always been hastily dismissed as merely ornamental solutions to approaching architecture. The close similarities in the physical appearances of CAD-based architecture despite employing different processes have also resulted in the lack of classifications for CAD-based architecture typologies. Current classifications that compare CAD and non-CAD-based architecture are too vague, while classifications that create a separate classification for CAD-based architecture are complex and become hard to understand. The study aims to help demystify CAD-based architecture and its processes, by presenting classifications of these processes in a manner that allows for a better and clearer overall understanding of CAD-based architecture and its typologies. This dissertation also delves deeper into one type of CAD-based design, material-based computational design. Recently, the move towards more material-based computational design was born out of the need to confine previous fantastical CAD-driven architecture forms to realized, buildable designs. The material-based computational design process grounds CAD architecture in reality, relating virtual models with real-world materials, and has the capacity to integrate different aspects of design; from structure, material, space, environmental performance, beyond just ornamentation. The material-based computational designs feature a CAD-based process that requires an initial inquiry into a building material’s properties. These properties are then used as parameters that inform the form generation process of the architecture, thus creating a material-based computational design. However, it begs the question of whether this CAD-based process generates new architectural typologies, or is merely a form generation tool.