Design Studio 18 Master of Architecture (MArch RIBA Part 2)
John Cook, Ben Pollock & Laura Nica
John Cook is an architect and research fellow. His expertise lies in the research and visualisation of climate change through data, aesthetics and cartographic means. @ClimateCartographics
Ben Pollock is an architect, research fellow, environmentalist and activist with an interest in regenerative development and climate adaptation. @ClimateCartographics
Laura Nica is a practicing architect, digital designer and doctoral researcher. Working on multiple interdisciplinary projects, her interest extends to material research, digital fabrication and assemblage processes. @ArchiveZ / @LauraNicaStudio
Architecture, Methods + Emergence: Flows, Forms & Functions
designstudio18.com / @ds18_westminster
Year 1: Shaima Al-Jalal, Isabel Atkinson, Tessa Cox, Beca Ellis, Bradley Fletcher, Sarah Gardner, Valeria Golban, Tobias Hobbs, Hannah Ismail, Muhammad Shaukat Ali, Kristina Veleva
Year 2: Ollie Astley, Adam Din, Diana Fox, Alistair Orchard-Mitchell, Naomi Punnett, Zixin Yao
This year DS18 embarked upon a new chapter centred around the concept of emergence, aiming to forefront process-driven design methodologies across morphodynamic and morphogenetic approaches, for the generation of landscape and architectural form. Students were tasked to develop their generative workflows from a study of the systems and material processes of their subject, integrated and adaptable to the dynamic conditions of its environment, whilst developed through experimentation, simulation and computation. We saw this as a fluid, abstracted and non-linear approach, where the design of the design process was as critical as the architectural outcome itself.
Based within the Fenlands in east England, our sites sat suitably between the tensions of Earth’s natural processes and anthropogenic control. Caught between river surges from the highlands and rising sea levels at the coastal wash, the overlapping Fenland networks cross cultures, economies and ecologies and balance on the precipice of local- and globally-scaled critical climatic thresholds. Our reading of this landscape was supported by a study trip to the Netherlands, once topographically linked to the Fens, to witness their history and mastery of natural systems control, and visiting colleagues at MIT’s Sensible Cities Labs, Amsterdam, TU Delft, Rotterdam and Eindhoven.
After further investigation into the sites, students abstracted their systems and flows into their foundational components – conditions, forces and parameters. e isolated and tested their variables to understand specific impacts, logics and behaviours over time, while recording, evaluating and feeding back into our iterative and interactive workflows. Finally, we tailored and deployed our generative procedures back on to site, to witness landscape and architectures that emerged and flourished amongst their environment, informing intelligent yet unpredictable outcomes, appropriate and adaptive to the uncertainty and extremity of our times.
Guest Critics: Sabina Blasiotti (Sabi Studio) Andy Bow (Foster + Partners), Anthony Boulanger (AY Architects), Katya Bryskina (IM-A Studio), Finbar Charleson (dRMM), Emma Colthurst, Corinna Dean, Mitesh Dixit (DOMAIN Office & Pratt SOA), Dhruv Gulabchande (HFM Architects & Narrative Practice), Andreas Körner, George Malliaropoulos (Populous), Andrei Martin (PLP Architects), Emma Kate Matthews, Will McLean, Fraser Morrison (Farshid Moussavi Architecture), Justin Nicholls (Fathom Architects), Lucia Rebolino (Forensic Architecture), Andrea Rossi, Yara Sharif, Guy Sinclair (Weber Industries), Ben Stringer, Filip Višnjić
Archive of DS18’s work from previous years:
