Week Nine : Further Research on Building Typology

Taking these micro typologies and up scaling them I am poised to consider how multiple parts of a system can come together and function in harmony. The proposition of a contemporary urban marketplace  means the integration of multiple components, which exist not only apart from one another in space but also in time. This will necessitate a solution which can contain and adapt to a range of activities and services.

Defining existing macro typologies:

Plug-in / plȗg /  noun - a core or interior segment taken from a larger matrix, informal. to add or include; incorporate.

The plug-in notion is a long withstanding concept, dating from an illustration by Le Corbusier for his Unite d'Habitation high-rise apartment block. It is an idea which has been remodelled and adapted repeatedly; Archigram proposed individual buildings and an entire city made of prefabricated components attached to fixed infrastructures. 

·         Responsive and self refreshing

·         Supportive of change and growth

·         Organic quality

·         Potential for urban infill

·         Utilised unused spaces in cities/ make better use of existing space

·         Ability to implement components in active nodes and move on when activity fades, seasonal

Image sources: Archi Takes / Inhabitat

Pre-Fabrication / prȅ-fȧb-rȋ-kȃt / noun - the manufacturing in advance, especially in standard sections that can be easily shipped and assembled

The basic premise behind prefabricated construction is the ability to manufacture the parts needed to create a building offsite and then assemble them swiftly, reducing the amount of labour required. Digital technologies and modern engineering have opened up new opportunities in this area.

WikiHouse is an ongoing experiment and its creators invite anyone with an interest in making housing available on a mass scale to engage with the project through an expanding online community where new designs can be added, improvements suggested and more developed hardware or software solutions plugged in to create an evolving ecosystem around the core principle of freely available, affordable and sustainable construction.

Images source: Archi Tonic

Aggregation

Not necessarily a new idea but an emerging trend, the notion of aggregating mechanical and biological devices is an emerging trend in imaging the future built environment. Representations of this concept perpetuate almost a self-constructivity and challenge the authoritarian nature typically associated with spaces of production. It is a movement liberating the stereotype of assembly, manufacturing and office spaces from authoritarian characteristic and instead interjected new principles of universal admission, democratic organisation and shared ownership.

Image source: The Funambulist

The following trends represent long withstanding typologies and demonstrate that such notions continually evolve as newly imagined manifestations. The challenge then is to consider their application within an emerging context and question how they will continue to adapt.