Burst*003
via Art Daily
Architecture Australia: The prototype house is achieved most elegantly here using pieces of laser-cut plywood brought to site on a single flat-bed truck. What is groundbreaking is that the aspiration for prototyping has been coupled with a formal complexity and potential for customization supported by new computer-supported design and manufacturing tools. The duo has been working for a decade now on the potentials for interlocking structures of smaller planar parts. Communicating the fabrication and assembly of 1,100 non-identical pieces required atypical forms of documentation, and with that, an original approach to thinking through how to design and realize that design.
Laying out the plywood pieces was achieved using the software program used in garment manufacture with very little wastage. While high technology is used throughout the design and manufacturing process, low technology is intentionally employed for assembly and for maintenance. Assembly requires fewer skills but intense cooperation and concentration. The building was put together by architecture students in something akin to a barn raising. The architects are fond of this image, yet recognize that the design’s reliance on numbers of enthusiastic and sympathetic cheap labourers will make it less desirable for some.
