Authors: Felix Amtsberg, Yijiang Huang, Daniel J.M. Marshall, Kevin Moreno Gata, Caitlin Mueller

Year: 2020

Citation: Amtsberg, F., Huang, Y., Marshall, D.J., Gata, K.M. and Mueller, C., 2020. Structural up-cycling: matching digital and natural geometry. Advances in Architectural Geometry.

DOI: https://thinkshell.fr/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/AAG2020_25_Amtsberg.pdf

Abstract

This paper presents a design-to-fabrication workflow for spatial structures that make best use of a given stock of tree forks. Still little explored, the reuse of structural components beyond their traditional lifecycle has the potential to significantly reduce the environmental impact of building structures. While previous work employs complex machining processes to harness the natural variation of tree forks, this work presents a new approach to optimize the use of resourced tree forks as load-bearing joints and find a matching between the intended geometry and naturally available inventory. This approach minimizes extra machine processing time by taking advantage of the structural potential of each individual tree fork that originates from its natural geometry and internal grain structure. The contributions of this paper include:

1. a digital approach for material library intake and management;
2. a geometric matching algorithm to match designed geometry and material library;
3. the development of a structural node geometry that facilitates an efficient automated fabrication process. A human-scale built prototype is presented to showcase the effectiveness of the proposed workflow, demonstrating its potential to be deployed in a practical architectural scale.

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