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Issue 86 of RuMoer delves into the innovative use of textile materials in architecture, highlighting their potential in creating adaptive façades that dynamically respond to varying climatic conditions and user needs. The publication showcases research and projects demonstrating how textile materials can contribute to reducing natural resource consumption, waste generation, and harmful emissions, while providing lightweight and functional solutions for contemporary architecture.
The article explores the use of i-Mesh, an innovative textile material, in the retractable covers of the promenades at Expo 2020. With its lightweight structure and delicate aesthetic, i-Mesh helped create authentic shaded areas, enhancing the visitor experience. Made of overlapping layers of mineral fiber, the material provides high performance in terms of thermal insulation, chemical damage resistance, and flame safety. i-Mesh’s production system allows fibers to be oriented in any direction, offering design freedom and minimizing production waste. Through the use of this material, Werner Sobek's team was able to eliminate traditional steel beams and optimize material usage. Moreover, the digital design process helped avoid waste, reduce construction time, and enable a fully automated retractable system to adapt to weather conditions. The membranes not only provide solar protection during the day but also become multifunctional surfaces that light up at night, transforming into projection screens and light diffusers. i-Mesh represents a perfect example of sustainable industrial design and manufacturing, contributing to the creation of an urban solar protection system that will continue to safeguard the walkways in the bright future of District 2020.
"Following the seismic events, some symbolic icons representing the very permanence of communities in places were lost, even beyond the physical presence of people. Through the case study of the Sanctuary of Madonna del Sole in Capodacqua, a district of Arquata del Tronto, the hypothesis of reconstructing some symbolic architectures was explored, using temporary and lightweight systems that could simultaneously evoke the magic and charm of the volumes and spaces of the original architecture, while making the losses suffered immediately visible and communicable, as well as highlighting the need for a more lasting reconstruction.
Immediately after the earthquake in August 2016, Istat estimated that 293 monuments (churches, palaces, hermitages, etc.) were destroyed or totally uninhabitable (https://www.istat.it/it/files//2016/09/Focus-sisma-15sett2016.pdf), a number that increased further after the subsequent shocks in October 2016 and January 2017.
The time for surveying and rebuilding historically and artistically significant buildings will inevitably be long, and for some, it will not be possible to consider rebuilding them in the same location. In this regard, the case of Arquata del Tronto represents an emblematic situation.
Given these premises, we aim to present a project that seeks to build on some interesting experiences carried out by artists like Edoardo Tresoldi, who, in the Early Christian Basilica of Santa Maria di Siponto, re-created the ancient volume through an ephemeral vision made with a metal mesh structure, bringing the installation to international prominence" (https://ilmanifesto.it/sculture-trasparenti-in-un-paesaggio-sonoro/).
The proposal presented here uses a wooden structure and an innovative material, I-Mesh, particularly suited for reconstructing an idea of space and volume through an intertwining of fibers with changing colors and an empathetic character. The material is capable of recreating the effect and chromatic qualities of stone, while being incredibly light, almost like fabric.
Rome has been exponentially increasing its lands use till 2030, with a rate of 3sm/minute. In the near future developers and authorities will have to face not only the restorations of existing building stocks, but also the environmental and social sustainable regeneration of wider open-air zones and still empty urban spaces (Ottone, Cocci Grifoni, 2018; Gehle, 2017). The study focuses on a representative cultural heritage built system in Rome - the Aurelian walls - which is listed as outstanding part of a new green infrastructure by the city regulatory plan. This ancient wall-ring surrounding the historical centre of Rome has seen as a potential area where to apply novel strategies of urban regeneration, due to the presence of several neglected urban zones and uncomfortable public spaces. Taking inspiration from Christo and Jean-Claude’s artistic avant-gardes interventions, the authors are envisioning the temporary application of lightweight composite meshes as a sun-shading protective path, able to interact with the thermal mass of the ancient walls, in order to increase the level of thermal comfort of the open-air urban spaces. The final goal is, on one hand, to simulate the performances of the developed textile shells’ building system and to assessment its potential of heatwaves mitigation, and, on the other hand, to investigate the replicability rules of temporary textile-based architecture as a mean for re-activating - in a sustainable and reversible manner - the urban live and the care of ancient and delicate, cultural heritage contexts.
The research project ADAPTEX pursues the goal of developing adaptive, energy-efficient textile sun shading systems using the smart material Shape Memory Alloy (SMA). Within this approach lies a high potential for novel sun protection systems demanding little energy or even self-sufficiently adapting to external stimuli while reducing operation and maintenance costs and at the same time offering solutions to tackle growing demand for sun and glare protection. A Design Categories Matrix is presented that brings together various involved fields from textile design and façade construction to smart material development. Based on this, two concepts have been further elaborated: ADAPTEX Wave and Mesh. Both incorporate SMA into textile structures but express different design and performance potential by changing the geometry and openness factor of the surface area. For further evaluation, various functional prototypes that scale up from 0.2 x 0.2 m to 1.35 x 2.80 m are developed and reviewed. The buildability and functionality of SMA-driven textile sun shading systems that incorporate requirements from the various involved fields are verified. The feasibility of parallel ADAPTEX Wave
and Mesh were assessed in comparison to the performance of state-of-the-art sun shading systems. The technological ideas are subsequently optimised and scaled up in various cycles for follow-up testing in both indoor and outdoor environments.
To summarize the concepts on which this book is based and present the work done by the author within the framework of research focused on the discussion of the new—and still largely unexplored—impacts of the digital revolution on architecture, I will refer to an article published in 2017 in Places Journal, written by Naomi Stead, journalist and architecture critic, as well as director of Architecture at Monash University.
The article addresses Robin Boyd, an Australian architect and critic not widely known in our region, and his essay Antiarchitecture, published in Architectural Forum in November 1968. Boyd was certainly a prominent figure in the architectural debate during the 1970s and a keen observer of his contemporaries, from the representatives of various utopian visions (Archigram, Venturi - Scott Brown) to Japanese Metabolism, and the extreme engineering of Fuller and Wacksman. “The goal, without exception, was to find, purify, and elevate the spirit of architecture.”
An architecture that, in order to continue to be loved, must come to terms with the loss of its traditional references and venture into unexplored territories, yet without losing its concreteness and purpose for which it must be considered necessary. The article defends and emphasizes the two most recognizable positions in the myriad of nuances that characterize contemporary orientations in this discipline.
On the right, you place those who still seek architecture in the Vitruvian sense: strength, utility, and appearance (however strange), somehow balanced. On the left, you place those who seek antiarchitecture, kicking away the third leg of the triad.
This “divertissement” brought to the present day helps us understand how architectural research and practice can finally (and without guilt) feel free to move forward, avoiding preconceived canons, yet delving into experimentation with absolute confidence, intertwining their aspirations with the disruptive forces that threaten the discipline’s compactness. Antiarchitecture goes beyond. It is compulsively opposed to established concepts, designs, and order. It desperately wants to connect with the revolutionaries of the great alliance of other arts and tear apart the core of architecture to find something absolutely different within it. Its creed is roughly this: burn, form, burn; from now on, only social pressures and technological development will shape buildings.
The paradox today lies in the great fragility that emerges from the condition of “reliance” on absolute certainties, while true intellectual strength arises in those who, despite all the formal and informal constraints we are now subjected to, seek to find a design energy derived from the dynamism of global evolutions, the constant mutations of the contexts in which we act, and the industrial and technological production always searching for new market spaces.
It is precisely from the encounter between opposing and continuously moving forces (those that Boyd defines as antiarchitecture) that architecture can find a different path: its strength lies in its softness. It is vaguely defined as art, and therefore can escape any attempt to crush it. It can satisfy any new societal or technological demand without losing its quality of inspiring ideas.
The very concept of Soft Architecture, as expressed in this book, aims to convey a dynamic and reactive condition of the architect, whose art consists not only in their products but also, and above all, in being intellectually aware of their role as a creator of connections. A role that is sometimes hidden in often invisible corners and thus not easily recognizable, unless exercised with the media power of “great ideas.”
The field of architectural facade design is increasingly linked to issues of energy efficiency and environmental sustainability. In particular, the building's facade acts as its transparent-breathable interface and, as such, serves as a vehicle and modulator of light and energy input into the interior space. The factors influencing this process and determining its adaptability and control include latitude and orientation, facade morphology, glazing properties, and the physical characteristics of shading devices.
Based on a study of the state-of-the-art shading devices currently in use, this research aimed to assess the energy savings induced by a highly technological new material, i-Mesh, when employed as a shading and screening system. The analyzed material can be easily adapted into infinite geometries, from simple meshes to highly complex patterns, and can be continuous or discontinuous, parallel or not to the facade plane.
i-Mesh is a technical fabric composed of various fibers—three of which are natural—coated with a polymeric material. This specific composition makes i-Mesh a highly flexible and high-performance shading solution.
Energy studies conducted on i-Mesh highlight its effects when used as a shading device applied to architectural facades.
The paper deals with a methodological workflow able to finalize a finite element calculation of fibre-reinforced meshes for architectural functions, e.g., for shading façade panels or canopies. Digital technologies allow for the fabrication of custom-made weaving, according to the expected function. Raw materials used for the fabrication of meshes have usually excellent flame-retardant properties, high mechanical performances, excellent thermal insulation power, and high resistance to attacks of chemical debris.
Besides optimizing the CNC fabrication of panels and the correct dimensioning of fibres, the objective of this research is to demonstrate the feasibility and to explore the potentialities as well as the difficulties of using the finite element method for the study of fibre-reinforced meshes, with the ultimate aim of developing a general analytical method for the full range of loadings.
In recent years, the morphology of urban landscapes has shown the expansion of cities into megacities characterized by narrower urban canyon profiles. One of the problems linked to increasing urban density and exacerbated by climate change is known as the urban heat island (UHI) phenomenon, which impacts external conditions due to the overheating of building surfaces. The research evaluates this phenomenon by studying an urban canyon where architectural façades are covered with an innovative high-tech fabric called i-Mesh. The study focuses on the analysis and optimization of the reflectance value of i-Mesh to transform building exteriors into “cool façades.” The research considers thermal performance and heat exchange between buildings and analyzes canyon surfaces as thermal masses in a new parametric methodology that constantly relates internal and external conditions. Microclimates and outdoor comfort are monitored by measuring canyon surface temperatures and the Universal Thermal Climate Index (UTCI). The indoor environment is observed through thermal loads and air temperatures. The study shows how i-Mesh can convert a standard wall into a cool façade, mitigating external conditions and reducing internal energy consumption.
Urban Heat Island (UHI) is a growing phenomenon taking place in dense urban environments and it is due to the lack of green areas and to the presence of built surfaces, which are typically characterized by low solar reflectance and high infrared emissivity. Furthermore, UHI is exacerbated by the Urban Heat Canyon configuration and InterBuilding effect, consisting in multiple reflections of the solar radiation, which remains entrapped inside the urban canyon. For that reason, built surfaces have a great potential in urban microclimate enhancement and UHI mitigation, particularly through the improvement of materials solar reflectance and thermal emissivity properties. In this context, outdoor tensile structures, such as curtains and awnings, could represent an effective way for UHI mitigation and human thermal comfort enhancement, through the selection of materials with high solar reflectance on the external side of the curtain and low infrared emittance downwards. The present work is focused on the characterization of a novel glass fibre-based material for outdoor curtains and awnings in terms of solar reflectance, thermal emittance and angular reflectivity. Findings show that the tested material reveals a good solar reflectance, while a high thermal emittance has been detected. For what concerns directional reflectivity, all samples present a retro-reflective trend for incident light angles near the perpendicular, while a specular tendency occurs for incident light directions near the horizontal.
This document summarizes the experiments and findings from the autonomous operation of the ADAPTEX system, both in a controlled environment and in practical use case scenarios. The ADAPTEX project, through a holistic research-by-design process, explores and tests the potential of adaptive structures, as highlighted in the report sections. The analysis includes details on the underlying concept, the research process, and the characteristics of the "Wave" and "Mesh" structures, which are the subject of several experiments. The results of in-depth tests on material characteristics, such as differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), force-tension-elongation curves, and load-dependent conversion temperatures, are presented. The analysis also covers the technology readiness level (TRL) and the implementation of proof-of-concept mockups.
Specifically, the project includes the selection of shape memory alloy (SMA) for the demo façade realization in Oman at PFB and the operational cycle test conducted at IWU. The behavior of the SMAs is examined through various tests, with results compared to real-world environmental conditions. The document also explores the autonomous operation of the system in a climate chamber at ISE and under ambient conditions at GU-Tech, with a focus on monitoring the Mesh and Wave structures. Special attention is given to the autonomous operation of the system in a double-skin façade at PFB, detailing the monitoring methodology, sensor setup, and microcontroller installation plan.
The document concludes with a comparison of SMA behavior between laboratory and ambient environments, as well as a comparative analysis of Austenite and Martensite in the Wave NiTiCu30_0.3mm material.
Adaptive Façade Systems: A Promising Approach for Dynamic Response to Environmental and User Demands
Adaptive façade systems offer a promising approach to achieving dynamic responses to varying weather conditions and individual user demands. Within the framework of the Collaborative Research Center (CRC) 1244 at the University of Stuttgart, the use of adaptive systems and their related architectural potential is explored with the aim of reducing the consumption of natural resources, waste generation, and hazardous emissions.
The targeted parameters for the façade design include solar radiation, temperature, wind speed, relative humidity, daylighting, and user interaction. To create an experimental platform for the research work, a 36.5-meter-high adaptive experimental tower, D1244, has been designed and constructed on the University campus. The tower’s temporary façade is being replaced floor by floor to validate different research approaches. The first implemented façades focus on textile systems due to their lightweight nature and the ease with which various functions can be integrated. Further material systems will be investigated in the near future.
In recent years, the urban climate has been progressively changing due to different causes that affect the environmental conditions.
One consequence of this metamorphosis and the growing building density is known as the urban heat island (UHI) factor, which alters the quality of outdoor spaces due to the overheating of building surfaces. Microclimate features influence indoor activities and human heat stress. The research aims to provide an answer to the problem caused by excessive solar radiation on the urban fabric and the consequent UHI factor. The following study focuses on different façade characterizations based on various materials with relevant reflectance efficiencies that transform the exterior of buildings into “cool façades”. The research considers the thermal performance of the building façade, the heat exchange between the building, and canyon surfaces as thermal masses in a new parametric methodology. Using thermodynamic tools connected by a parametric engine, the analysis demonstrates how cool façades reduce heat transfer to both the building and the environment. The study analyzes façade materials related to their shading capacity, high reflectivity, and emissivity in different urban canyon scenarios. Microclimates and outdoor comfort are monitored by measuring the canyon surface temperatures and the Universal Thermal Climate index (UTCI), which combines air temperature, humidity, mean radiant temperature, and wind speed. The indoor environment is observed using air temperatures. The study reveals how cool façades help to improve outdoor as well as indoor conditions.