Marble Fairbanks Flatform

Marble Fairbanks is a New York based architecture, design, and research office, which gained notoriety with a project entitled Flatform. Flatform is a panel system developed by Marble Fairbanks through the use of technology. The panels are designed and created through computer numerically controlled (CNC) devices.

The panels are created by cutting, scoring, and folding stainless steel to create a three-dimensional panel system. Because the system uses tabs as connectors, fasteners are not needed. The panels are flat sheets of stainless steel with the necessary cuts and perforations, the flat sheets can then be shipped to the site, where assembly will also take place.

The system can be designed to have a variety of patterns and levels of opacity (based on the number of cuts, folds, tabs, etc). The patterns are developed digitally and then sent to a CNC router to cut the stainless steel to the exact specifications. These details allow the panels to be made perfectly and set up for on-site fabrication.

By illustrating the technique of using digital processes for all aspects of the project, Marble Fairbanks linked the concept, design, fabrication, and assembly phases seamlessly. While on a smaller scale, Marble Fairbanks believes this is the future of architecture. The future will have architecture generated through the use of CNC processes, allowing smoother transitions and communication between phases, as well as movement toward prefabrication and less material through the use of integrating all aspect of design.

Transformer shelf by Martin Saemmer - Jun

transformer-shelf
The 120 x 85 x 75 cm size piece of furniture is composed of eight different modules, which are connected by an interlocking
construction system to form a rectangular object. Drawn up in a reduced style, the compact body of the Transformer can be
expanded through the active use of the drawer elements, simultaneously revealing the open inner structure.
There are overall 20 different possibilities to insert elements in different sizes. The harmonised arrangement of shelf areas,
recesses and lateral notches offers a maximal effective area of the modules, which are assimilated to standardised measure-
ments. The cumulative height of the object, for example, corresponds to the dimensions of a worktable, while the drawer slots
are in accordance with DIN. With a potential extended size of up to 3,7 meters per side the Transformer not only functions as
a fluid shelving system, as a free-standing piece of furniture with a levitating character it can also serve as a partition.

Airspace Tokyo by Thom Faulders - Jun

AIRSPACE TOKYO

Screen Façade Design: Thom Faulders, with Proces2 in San Francisco Building Design: Studio M/Hajime Masubuchi in Tokyo
The project creates an exterior building skin for a new four story multi-family dwelling unit with professional photography studios in Tokyo, Japan. Located in the Kitamagome Ota-ku district, the site was previously occupied by the owner's family with a residence uniquely wrapped by a layer of dense vegetation. Since the entire site was razed to accommodate construction for the new larger development, the design invents an architectural system that performs with similar attributes to the demolished green strip and creates a new atmospheric space of protection.
Conceived as a thin interstitial environment, the articulated densities of the porous and open-celled meshwork are layered in response to the inner workings of the building's program. AirSpace is a zone where the artificial blends with nature: sunlight is refracted along its metallic surfaces; rainwater is channeled away from exterior walkways via capillary action; and interior views are shielded behind its variegated and foliage-like cover

de Young Museum - Sam

Cupper skin of the de Young museum

some interior views

De Young Museum by Herzog & de Meuron - Sam

de Young with twist tower

De Young Museum by Herzog & de Meuron - Sam

Cristina Murillo_Ductal Concrete Panels by OTA+

Design: Kory Bieg (K Bieg Design), Andre Caradec (S/tudio U/nder M/anufacture)
Concrete: ConcreteWorks

They where contacted by ConcreteWorks to test the limitations and potential of Ductal; an ultra-high performance fiber reinforced concrete. The material offers superior strength, durability and the capacity to span large openings with minimal thickness when compared to traditional concrete. In addition, the material is highly moldable and can be poured into small pockets, filling gaps that would otherwise be impossible using standard reinforcing. They used advanced computer modeling software to generate a pattern that would allow seamless tiling from one panel to the next. In addition, the pattern could grow or shrink and be open or closed, depending on the requirements of the client, site and program. The design could be implemented on the exterior of a building as a superficial rain screen, or integrated into a weatherproof exterior facade system. It could also be used on the interior of a building as visual screen or focal wall. The panel was fabricated using a CNC mill. The mill allowed them to bypass the time-consuming process of drafting 2d drawings. After finalizing the computer model, they simply uploaded the 3d information directly to the milling machine, which then cut the form from a block of foam. Ductal was then poured into the foam mold. After a few days of drying, the final panel was extracted from the mold and ready to be installed.

On the left is an image of the CNC milled foam mold, before the Ductal is poured. The image on the right is a rendering of the 3d computer model used to mill the mold.