Abstract:

The paper presents some first results of an experience born during the curricular internship within the Bachelor’s Degree in "Architectural Design" of the Politecnico di Milano in collaboration with field professionals. The study is part of a broader research whose theme is the development over time of the relationship between form and structure in buildings. The aim of this research is studying and defining the evolution of tools to optimize design choices.

In the contemporary panorama of architecture and industrial production, approaches and tools, characterized by the possibility of varying the formal outcome starting from the identification of input parameters and calculation algorithms, are tested.

The most commonly used approach in the design phase is characterized by an initial definition of the shape and subsequently by its optimization starting from both point and global checks.

The didactic experience followed a different design process: starting from a historical survey of experiences that introduced the parameterization of a form as object of study (treatises, manuals, mechanical constructions, buildings), it has been identified the underlying methodological approach and subsequently the same approach has been applied through the use of generative design software trying to build new links between teaching and research.

The work required the creation of a team with multidisciplinary skills: historical-archival research, numerical analysis, architectural design, parametric modelling, structural verification.

The paper is divided into four parts.
The first part presents some paradigmatic experiences of the form-structure relationship in engineering, retracing in particular the studies of Galileo Galilei and Pierre Simon Girard. Through explanatory graphic tables and synthesis of the main innovative theoretical aspects, the work reveals first significant features that will help to develop new methodological approaches.

In the second part the principles and some experiences that led from meta-design to Generative Design are retraced. Through diagrams and exemplary schemes, the work presents some educational moments dedicated to understanding the methodologies from which the project software is developed.

In the third part, some experiments developed in the didactic experience are shown (through three-dimensional modelling) with the purpose of both comparing different formal solutions and introducing useful parameters for the evaluation of phenomena that can further improve formal optimization.

A conclusive part synthetically elaborates the didactic experience and highlights on one hand the learning outcomes and the acquired skills and on the other possible research developments.

Keywords:

Genrerative Design.