DD03 studio tutors:
David Lin (Zaha Hadid Architects)
Tony Zhao (Zaha Hadid Architects)

Not so alien after all:
Compared to other worlds, our planet is not unique; their composition, structure, and chemical elements are almost the same. 1) Today, we find that Mercury closest to the sun, there is still a large amount of water ice in the polar regions; 2) Venus used to have the same vast ocean and delicate atmosphere as Earth, especially like the environment of Venus high atmosphere is very close to the Earth’s atmosphere; 3) The Martian environment was once more humid and habitable than Earth; 4) Europa has underground oceans and underwater hot springs. Of course, there are more and more data returning from on-going space expediations.

From scientific facts to architectural concepts:
The challenge is to put forward convincing architectural proposals under reasonable physical criteria, especially related to the living environment period and associated parameters, such as planetary gravity, temperature, pressure, climate, atmospheric wind, geological activity, solar radiation, fundamental design conditions. These fascinating scientific knowledge provide a fertile foundation for innovative architectural concepts.

Geometry explorations driven by extreme activities:
Since, we position the studio to investigate and propose architecture designs that are reachable at a predictable time from the perspective of technological theory; before 2050. Most crucially, we must question our preconception of architecture related to travels, it means we need to untrain ourselves as earthling architects then we must imaginatively digest extreme conditions on other planets with romance and playfulness. Our studio speculates on a future space tourism/ vacation industry. We ask students to design a small-scale vacation hotel with corresponding local vacation activities.
Outer space architecture representations:
We hope to face the real space environment and challenges. The technology we have combined with the appropriate imagination to re-imagine the problem of survival in outer space and design the lifestyle of outer space, instead of avoiding the issue by distant deified technology, so that we can give more references to the realisation of interplanetary species in the future.

Software:
Prior knowledge of 3D modelling is preferred for this workshop, the studio will also provide Modo software training. We will mainly use Rhinoceros 3D for concept/massing designs, V-ray for rendering and as well as Modo – Mesh Fusion for procedural 3D modelling. Students should install the software mentioned before the workshop.

DR10 studio tutors:
Ivan Chan (Design tutor at Bartlett and University of Edinburgh)
Herman Ho (Game and Digital design tutor at UAL, London)
Ives Ma (Design Director of IMA)

The essence of temporality has long challenged our preoccupation with long-term strategies and masterplans, questioning our ability to address social transformation in the face of increasing resource constraints, as well as political and economic uncertainty. In India, Kumbh Mela hosts millions of pilgrams once every 12 years. The occurance of “the temporary festival city” is dictated by the natural tidal cycle of the Ganges River. Located in the floodplain of the river Ganges, most of the 23.5-square-kilometer area of the Kumbh Mela remains underwater until a few months before the festival and will only last for one to three months, until the site is flooded again. The organization at every stage is challenged by the uncertainty and transience of the festival itself.

Humans have long harboured an obsession with living forever. For some, it is an utopian fantasy to be immortal. Previously our studio has explored human’s obsession in eternity, and how the manifestation of immortality can be employed in architectural and speculative urban design. Over the past, many societies, architects, and city planners have conceived architecture as solidly stable and resistant to the weather, nature and time, while buildings that do not last are understood merely in terms of failure and decay. Our previous projects have responded to the fear of expiry, ageing and dying, questioning the very fundamental desire of human civilization.

In this workshop, we re-visit and critically reflect upon the topic of eternality. By critically assessing the potential possibilities from being transient and short-lived, our studio aims to celebrate the grace of the temporality, and argues that decay and being temporary represent potential as well as loss. Our research identifies an alternative and significant history of architecture and precedents in which buildings and cities can be imagined to decay, disintegrate and disappear. The understanding of temporary urban landscape will address social agendas in culture and communities, economies and ecologies, politics and policy.

DR30 studio tutors:
Alan Lock (Director at Studio Env and Designer at BDP)
Hasan Al-Rashid (Foster and Partners)
Filippo Mecheri (KPF)
William Payram (10 Design)
Rishabk Shah (Edward Williams Arch.)

In this studio we articulate that not all forms of architecture are discernible from their surface, they have deeper structures at play. Today all these phantoms are instructed by diverse anti-social layers, redundant economic enclosures and residual historical spaces which produce a sense of being in a complex environment.

But the world will not evolve past its current state of crisis by using the same thinking that created the situation. Through the lens of urban design, we challenge you in this studio to see what others don’t.

The studio will propose a territorial urban strategy, exploring architecture as a catalyst for spatial and political change, and weave together new spatial conditions through the design of micro-infrastructures that exist within an urban schematic.

Phase One | Research: Architectural Dissection
This phase is defining as a direct response to a contemporary crisis in The City.

As architects, we are often presented with an urban context as a formal starting point of a project, we are challenged to constantly rethink how we embrace the dynamic between the architecture we produce and these external forces. We can use the ongoing crisis in the city as the true opportunity to reflect and renew, so that we can respond, rather than insecurely react.

Since crises are always latent until officially declared, we will attempt to extract the meaningful, revealing the anthropological extent of a condition through a curated constellation of objects, media, events, and histories. Engaging socio-economically and geo-politically, to highlight key moments in time where we begin to make clear and irreversible decisions.

Phase Two | Mapping: Urban Design & Spatial Diagnostics
Through an urban design proposal, you will begin to amass your speculative urban design proposals and test their architectural associations through micro-design provocations. We will sway back and forth in your declared crisis, between things that we have revealed, yet to be declared, and things that are seen, but yet to be understood.

This phase will be structured through several design exercises and guest workshops in QGIS, AutoCAD, Revit, Rhino and Grasshopper.

Phase Three | Architectural Design: The Brief to the City
As the wider role of architecture in our society is unconstrained, this studio argues for the power of continued traditional provocations. Used to explore the architectural scale through materials, components, proposals, composition, and time; the provocation is a platform for architectural experimentation, it pushes the argument to an extreme, to be abundantly clear of the position taken and our attitudes towards the discipline.

Provocations are not intended to be a true representation of a solution but are powerful images that speak of many levels of the project.

In this phase we will move to intense design experimentation. We will actively build your architectural project(s) as a series of crucial moments and discreet interventions. These will slowly grow in numbers and complexity as they will make up a wider, geo-political and socio-economic territorial project.

These select moments will require a combination of conceptual agility, technological fluidity, and spatial intelligence. By critically positioning ourselves to existing strategies and their territorial impact, we can reposition ourselves to produce an uncompromising territorial transformation.

The end result will be a short, but powerful brief to the city.

Design Software & Workflow
Phase One: QGIS, AutoCAD
Phase Two: Revit, Rhino, Grasshopper
Phase Three: Illustrator & Photoshop

DR50 studio tutors:
Ben Tseng (Architect at Foster and Partners)
Adrian Gonzalez Rincon (Architect at Foster and Partners)
Teo Andonov (Procedural design from Bartlett, UK)

Possible Time Travel references
Did you wake up from a coma / hibernation?
Did you fell into a wormhole / black hole in space?
Could you still return to the present day?
Why did you start drawing up this visual diary?

Projecting the Past to the Future
In the history of human technological development, the urban cities have been evolving in an exponential way. Students are encouraged to look at past architectural references such as the ‘Invisible Cities’ by Italo Calvino written in 1972. Some of these historical ‘futuristic’ predictions did actualise with new technologies being available.

The studio asks students to envision what could happen with certain conditions being met in the future. This could develop into an interesting project to look back at as we time travelled to 2030 in the slow and usual way.
Research Topics
1. Technology Advancement
2. Change in Social Philosophy
3. Urban or Landscape Development

As part of the imaginative future, tutors would guide students into in research in 3 key focuses within these categories above.

Possible Utopian & Dystopian Futures
Ideologies & Social Movements (e.g. anti-racism, veganism, gender equality, inclusivity, etc..)
Transportation (e.g. Hyperloop, Rockets, Scooters, etc..)
Political (e.g. Government surveillance, human rights, international relations, etc..)
Financial (e.g. Cryptocurrency, NFTs, etc..)
Global problems (e.g. Overpopulation, energy crisis, global warming, panedmics, etc..)

Design Methodology
The research topics and the project site of your choice will be fundamentally focusing on spaces in the human scale and the urban scale. The research fundings would be the parameters that students should utilise for building design beyond week 4. Tutorials would then be given on computational design software Grasshopper that are specified to your project needs.

Design Software & Workflow
Concept: Photoshop & Illustrator
Modelling: Rhino & Grasshopper
Rendering: Lumion & Enscape