Manufacturing the Bespoke: Making and Prototyping Architecture

Never have roles, methods and capabilities within disciplines of building production been in such unprecedented flux. Manufacturing the Bespoke brings clarity to this subject by featuring new essays from pioneering architects, engineers, academics and designers from around the world on new and unbuilt structures. It is an original and informative reader that focuses on the translation of architectural ideas from conceptual stage to their final physical realisation. Contributing contemporary architects include: Charles Walker at Zaha Hadid Architects; Mark Burry on the completion of the Sagrada Família in Barcelona; and Philip Beesley. The book encompasses a number of extended articles by internationally renowned critics, theorists, educators and designers, such as Matthias Kohler, Neri Oxman, Peter Salter and Michael Stacey. This AD Reader provides a definitive reference for every ambitious student, designer, critic, historian or engineer, looking to fathom the multitude of strands that influence the manufacture of man’s most prolific occupation in the 21st century. It covers an extensive territory of intellectual pursuit through the relentless acts of design, manufacture and construction, and aims to contextualise and define new meanings for architectural production in the post–digital age. Leading lights, exploring alternate meanings for practice, research, theory and innovation, are placed side by side in a volume of vibrant and visual discourse. Contributors include: Philip Beesley, Mark Burry, Xavier De Kestelier, Matthias Kohler and Peter Salter. Articles examine and refer to key portfolios of the 20th and 21st century including works by Pierre Chareau, Adolf Loos, Rural Studio and sixteen∗(makers). Topics range from analogue and digital craft, to the bespoke as a tactical approach to how architecture is made, understood and experienced.

6 Introduction Bob Sheil 14 From Making the Bespoke to Manufacturing the Bespoke Bob Sheil 28 The Bespoke is a Way of Working, Not a Style Stephen Gage 42 Models, Prototypes and Archetypes: Fresh Dilemmas Emerging from the ′File to Factory′ Era Mark Burry 58 Digital Craft in the Making of Architecture Michael Stacey 78 R–O–B: Towards a Bespoke Building Process Tobias Bonwetsch, Fabio Gramazio and Matthias Kohler 88 The Matter of Pochoir and the Imaging of the Maison de Verre Mary Vaughan Johnson 102 Soil and Protoplasm Designing the Hylozoic Ground Component System Philip Beesley 120 Wai Mer Road Peter Salter 132 The Fore Cast Mark West 146 Drawing Out an Indeterminate Duration Nat Chard 162 Incisions in the Haze Kate Davies and Emmanuel Vercruysse; Liquidfactory 174 An Interview with Frank Fantauzzi from Iceberg Project Natalija Subotincic 182 Grymsdyke Farm: An Enquiry into Making on Site Guan Lee 194 The Rural Studio: Between a Twister and a Hurricane Anderson Inge 208 Fractal, Bad Hair, Swoosh and Driftwood: Pavilions of AA Intermediate Unit 2, 2006–09 Charles Walker and Martin Self 220 Microstructure, Microstructure and the Steering of Material Proclivities Phil Ayres 238 Print to Protocell Rachel Armstrong 248 Large–Scale Additive Fabrication: Freeform Construction Xavier De Kestelier and Richard Buswell 256 Material Computation Neri Oxman 266 Models of Risk: Craft Past and Present in Prototyping for Human Space Flight Constance Adams 276 Index

Bob Sheil is the Director of Technology and Computing at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London. He is a founding partner in sixteen∗(makers), a workshop–based architectural practice, whose work has been widely published and exhibited internationally. He guest–edited AD Design through Making (July/August 2005, John Wiley & Sons Ltd), and AD Protoarchitecture (May/June 2008, John Wiley & Sons Ltd).