Category: Architecture

A Twitter-reactive garden could provide a prototype for the future development of ‘smart’ buildings that can adapt to our emotional state.

The structure has been created by academics from the University of Lincoln, UK, taking its inspiration from the University’s Digital Capabilities garden, which won Gold at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2013.

The STAN (Science Technology Architecture Networks) research project, which involves computer scientists and architects, is exploring whether architecture is able to reflect and map human emotions.

The garden consists of an articulating raw steel structure, which sits vertically and horizontally, and is controlled by people’s responses via Twitter. In this way it is continuously revealing what the landscape is covering, while also remodelling itself.

The STAN project will be making its first public appearance at the Garden Up horticultural event in Sheffield on 7th and 8th June 2014.

The garden will react to activity on Twitter when people use the #gardenup hashtag, translating this information into movements of the garden’s mechanical landscape.

Richard M Wright, Senior Lecturer in the Lincoln School of Architecture, developed the construct, together with fellow academic Barbara Griffin and students Amy Hayeselden, Nicholas Sharpe and Liam Bennett from the University’s School of Architecture.

He said: “The garden essentially points to a future in which buildings could modify themselves in response to monitoring our emotional state via social media. For example, if we feel like wearing a big cosy jumper and sipping a cup of boiling hot soup, it will turn the temperature down and open a window. Buildings may also begin to reflect the mood of a populace by changing colour or shape, constantly remapping our perception of our urban environment, with façades becoming animated, reflective and mobile in response to communal desires and emotions.

“The fact we decided to retain the structure’s raw metal appearance is a tangible reminder of Sheffield’s industrial past, changing and weathering as a result of the environment.”

Dr Duncan Rowland, a fine artist and Reader in the School of Computer Science, developed the software application. He added: “We exist in a dynamic flux of social information; the software aims to intercept and expose some of this data in a tangible representation.”

The STAN project will also be making an appearance at the Lincolnshire Show which takes place on 18th and 19th June 2014.

Horticultural experts, Crowders Nurseries of Horncastle, will be providing the plants for Lincolnshire Show with Samantha Snowden providing horticultural and plant design expertise for both events.

Follow @thestanproject on Twitter to learn more about the project.

Saturday 15^th March saw forty applicants for BA (Hons) Architecture taking part in an intensive studio session. They worked with twelve student tutors from second third and fifth years to create fantastic models based on Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities. The book is a conversation between Marco Polo and Kublai Khan describing the cities the explorer has visited in his travels around the Khan’s empire.

Each group of four applicants was given a fragment of text and, working very quickly, produced 2D representations of the city they imagined. With their student tutor, the group decided on the most promising aspects to bring together to make their 3D representation. They could choose to model the whole city at Lilliputian scale or to model a representative fragment of the city at close to full scale.

The three-hour project engaged us in multi-disciplinary teamwork of the kind that we can expect all designers to experience in contemporary practice. The project also tested ingenuity in spotting the potential in materials and adapting proposals to accommodate evolving ideas generated by the group.

This project demonstrated that a great deal can be achieved in a short time by imaginative people exploring architecture in a creative environment. The buzz and the energy generated and the beautiful work produced made this a great experience for everyone involved. We can’t wait to start work for real with this group of applicants as the core of our first year in September 2014.

Hey, you, would you like to learn more about sustainable, vernacular and natural architecture? If the answer is yes then you’re in luck, as next Wednesday (the 26th February) you can meet the East Midland Earth Stucture Society (EMESS) to discuss ‘radical eco-architecture’.

Sound good? Hop on over to the MB1009 in the MAB at 7pm to get involved. ArchLOVE will be there to present on those issues along with members of the Abundant Earth Community so this will be a great opportunity to discover more about alternative architectural practices from some people who work with them every day.

Students at the Lincoln School of Architecture start producing concept and model work from the minute they arrive, but up until now that work has only been seen by their peers, their tutors and anyone else they choose to show themselves.

All of that is about to change, with the launch of our brand new portfolio site. Designed to show off the best of the School’s creativity, the site will be updated to bring you all the latest gems coming out from across the year groups. Put together by our own Barbara Griffin, senior lecturer on the MArch course, we’re sure you’ll agree that it looks AMAZING and showcases the great range of what our students have to offer.

You can see the site here. Check back often to see everything what’s being produced.