The aim of the Computational Urban Design course is to empower students with the capacity to fully understand and exploit computational thinking in order to design complex algorithmic pipelines from raw data to design.
Credits: Vondelpark Reconfigured (IAAC project 2021-22) by Kriti Nirmal, Pushkar Runwal, Weronika Sojka, Lucas Zargozo
Computational Urban Design course exploits Grasshopper 3D as the main computational tool because of its intuitiveness, and its large use in the AEC and the planning field. Despite no prior knowledge of programming is required, throughout the course students will master advanced computational logics that will enhance their design workflows in accomplishing the challenges of this course, and of the future profession more in general.
After an initial introduction on the interface and the basics, the goal of the first part of the course is to establish a clear methodology to import and visualize data in Grasshopper. Participants will become familiar with the complexity of data-informed processes and will experience how simple computational logics can deeply alter the way in which they approach an urban project. Consequently, the second part of the course will focus on the application of iterative computational processes to explore and create design solutions – and so – to process and create-by data. Participants will be challenged with a portfolio of advanced logics that they will independently analyse to address selected urban issues, achieving results that would remain inaccessible otherwise.
Using a visiblity map in the residential district of Montserratina in Viladecans, Catalunya, we aim to identify which junctions in the most popular route or routes are safe and what street typologies promote safety. VILADECANS We were working on a project that had as an objective to create healthy and safe spaces for the city … Read more
The project started with an experiment to see if an agent could follow a line and illuminate its path to see obstacles. The light is composed of isovits and only the ones in front of the agent are colored. The experiment went then to make the light 3D to illuminate buildings facades. Many approaches were … Read more
This exercise undertakes developing a shortest path simulation on varied terrains. Starting with basic point-to-point movements, I integrated agent behavior, enabling these agents to make decisions and take actions to move towards the destination point by choosing the best available option. The development of the simulation follows agent movement behaviors from two separate algorithms: Movement … Read more
This computational design project aims to inform a decision regarding a design problem that we run into in our Self-Sufficient Buildings course. The problem is to identify an optimal ratio between the height and number of “sand stoppers” on the roof of a budling that is built to be buried by sand over time. Our … Read more
The project reflects on how people in ancient times defined natural and weather phenomena. The proposal is to create an open public space – Inspired by the concept of an ancient sanctuary with places that used to be built for worship and predictions of weather conditions, the Meteo Sanctum consists of digital indicators that allow … Read more
Mixed use pavilion with dominant cultural function. Cultural venue Barcelona Cloud. Envisioned constraints: not less than 1/10 for public spaces on the North and South, permeable transit corridors the ground level for large groups of pedestrians, solar envelope by summer solstice and average height of neighborhood buildings restrict height and shape the shadowing canopy, trees … Read more
“Bio-Digital Path” is a computational model of modular public spaces generated from emerging public movements within the existing urban fabric of Barcelona. Global challenges consist of both environmental threats, but also social challenges and this project suggests that planners and architects actually have the tools to construct the public space not as a separate but … Read more
