Computational Design, Parametric Modeling, and Architectural Education

Architectural education in its relation to computational technologies is both becoming a part of these studies and having the potential of renovating itself with the knowledge of emerging technologies. This paper, in this framework, will be presenting a design research studio that aims at developing relational thinking capabilities in the computational design process. In this studio, topics of parametric design, parametric modeling, and relationality were questioned through the design process. In the 2006-2007 spring semester in the Graduate Studio II course of the Computational Design Program at Yildiz Technical University, parametric modeling software, GenerativeComponents, was introduced to question the pros and cons of parametric design in architecture. In this software, there are no ready-made geometric primitives or shapes. Point is the only ready-made drawing element to use. A geometric shape is constructed by associating elements with each other. Each geometric association can be done through several commands with different parameters. The end product is a parameter-based entity. Parameters can be changed easily, which in turn changes the whole geometric shape. In this design research studio held by 10 students, the topics of parametric design and associative thinking are questioned to explore their effect on the practices of architectural design and education.

Yalınay, Ş., Özsel, F., Yazar, T. (2008) “Computational Design, Parametric Modeling and Architectural Education”, in Ş.T. Pektaş (ed.), ARKITEKT 04-05:685-693, İstanbul

Below are some student works (Caner Kutsal and E.Sedat Özdemir) presented in the paper:

Here is the full paper, explaining the studio and the use of the tool (Generative Components): [PDF File]