Adaptive Ecologies: Correlated Systems of Living

by Theodore Spyropoulos

Recent architecture has found itself having to cope with new social and cultural complexities that demand networked systems that are time- based, reconfigurable and evolutionary, and a corresponding model of urbanism defined as an adaptive ecology.

It is against this backdrop that the AA’s graduate Design Research Lab (DRL) has pursued its recent studio agenda through project-based research focusing on alternative models of housing. Integral to this research is a notion of architecture that looks towards designing systems that seek higher ordered goals emerging through an intimate correlation of material and computational interaction. This book presents the results of this research and with it constructs a generative view of space and structure and the exploration of behaviour based models of living through patterns found in nature.

Authored by Theodore Spyropoulos, with contributing essays by John Frazer, John Henry Holland, Makoto Sei Watanabe, Patrik Schumacher, Mark Burry, Brett Steele,and David Ruy.

London, 2013, 24 x 18.5 cm, illustrated, 336pp. Hardback.

AADRL Documents 2: DRL Ten: A Design Research Compendium

Edited by Tom Verebes

DRL TEN evaluates the first decade of the AA's acclaimed post-professional masters programme in architecture and urbanism, the Design Research Lab. Since 1997 the programme has championed a project-based and research-driven approach to design, continually reinventing itself across successive design research agendas. The book reflects upon the DRL;s collaborative teaching and learning methods, which have contributed to the wholesale re-formulation of contemporary architectural practice during a decade in which digital communication, information, design and production technologies have gone from being nascent and emerging to being embedded in new forms of networked architectural education and practice. Understanding this (r)evolution is fundamental to the DRL's pursuit of innovation and the role design research plays in contemporary design culture. The structure of this book elaborates on how the programme has evolved the terms of design as a form of research over the last decade, with chapters focusing on the DRL's research agendas, topics, curricula, documents, media, methods and tools as well as a selection of work by its 350+ graduates.

Parametricism 2.0: Rethinking Architecture's Agenda for the 21st Century

Edited by Patrik Schumacher

Parametricism is an avant-garde architecture and design movement that has been growing and maturing over the last 15 years, emerging as a remarkable global force. The tendency started in architecture but now encompasses all design disciplines, from urban design to fashion. In architecture, the style has an international following and is currently progressing beyond its experimental roots to make an impact on a broader scale, with practices like Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) winning and completing large-scale architectural projects worldwide. Parametricism implies that all elements and aspects of an architectural composition or product are parametrically malleable; and the style owes its original, unmistakable physiognomy to its unprecedented use of computational design tools and fabrication methods. All design parameters are conceived as variables that allow the design to vary and adapt to the diverse, complex and dynamic requirements of contemporary society. Although Parametricism has been talked about and hotly debated for a number of years, so far there has been no publication dedicated to Parametricism. The issue is guest-edited by Patrik Schumacher, partner at ZHA, and one of the world's most highly renowned advocates of Parametricism.

Contributors: Philippe Block, Shajay Bhooshan, Mark Burry, Mario Carpo, Manuel DeLanda, John Frazer, Mark Foster Gage, Enriqueta Llabres and Eduardo Rico, Achim Menges, Theodore Spyropoulos, Robert Stuart-Smith, Philip F Yuan.

Featured architects and designers: Arup, Mark Fornes / THEVERYMANY, Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) and Ross Lovegrove.

The Autopoiesis of Architecture, Volume I: A New Framework for Architecture

by Patrik Schumacher

Take a theoretical approach to architecture with The Autopoiesis of Architecture, which presents the topic as a discipline with its own unique logic. Architecture's conception of itself is addressed as well as its development within wider contemporary society. Author Patrik Schumacher offers innovative treatment that enriches architectural theory with a coordinated arsenal of concepts facilitating both detailed analysis and insightful comparisons with other domains, such as art, science and politics. He explores how the various modes of communication comprising architecture depend upon each other, combine, and form a unique subsystem of society that co-evolves with other important autopoietic subsystems like art, science, politics and the economy. The first of two volumes that together present a comprehensive account of architecture's autopoiesis, this book elaborates the theory of architecture’s autopoeisis in 8 parts, 50 sections and 200 chapters.

The Autopoiesis of Architecture, Volume II: A New Agenda for Architecture

by Patrik Schumacher

This is the second part of a major theoretical work by Patrik Schumacher, which outlines how the discipline of architecture should be understood as its own distinct system of communication. Autopoeisis comes from the Greek and means literally self-production; it was first adopted in biology in the 1970s to describe the essential characteristics of life as a circular self-organizing system and has since been transposed into a theory of social systems. This new approach offers architecture an arsenal of general comparative concepts. It allows architecture to be understood as a distinct discipline, which can be analyzed in elaborate detail while at the same time offering insightful comparisons with other subject areas, such as art, science and political discourse. On the basis of such comparisons the book insists on the necessity of disciplinary autonomy and argues for a sharp demarcation of design from both art and engineering. Schumacher accordingly argues controversially that design as a discipline has its own sui generis intelligence – with its own internal logic, reach and limitations .The volume explicitly addresses how current architecture can upgrade its design methodology in the face of an increasingly demanding task environment, characterized by both complexity and novelty. Architecture’s specific role within contemporary society is explained and its relationship to politics is clarified. Finally, the new, global style of Parametricism is introduced and theoretically grounded.