Design Mathematics Student Work: Pi Chapel
Today, I am introducing a student work from the Design Mathematics course. Foad Sarsangi is a very talented designer, who attended my elective course last semester. The final project he studied was inspired by Peter Zumthor’s Bruder Klaus chapel. Foad wanted to experience its special production process. However, as the course was about “mathematics”, he also studied, solved, and generated an interior volume to be subtracted from a solid mass. Here are the project documents:
This is the production workflow. Is it really related to a “mathematical” approach? I don’t know. To be honest, I didn’t care about that much. Because Foad managed to use the coding skills he gained in the course.
He studied and generated the interior volume and its contour sections. Similar to the other projects, he managed to explain the parametric equations. He developed the below Grasshopper code to implement this equation.
After the Grasshopper definition that calculates the surface using the parametric function, he produced the prototype.
This is the production process. He actually built the interior volume from wooden planks, creating a mold. Then, he poured concrete. Finally, he burnt the wooden mold to create the void.
This is an interesting example of how designers can use and manipulate mathematics for their own purposes! Therefore, the student work of Design Mathematics course reminded me to include creativity at all phases of the course. I am happy with those extraordinary students and their ideas.
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