#design-education

How much work we did last year for first-year architectural education! The tensile fabric study we carried out using Grasshopper Kangaroo in “Design Computing”, a first-year course I coordinated alongside my colleague Serkan Uysal, served as a baseline for the material research addressed in the Basic Design studio at that time. Such geometric optimizations in Kangaroo are no longer surprising or novel to anyone. However, experiencing these tools and possibilities in architectural education in the very first year offers a…

Let’s take a closer look at the midterm jury assignment for our “Field & Matter”- themed Computation-based Basic Design 2 studio, which I conducted last year alongside Serkan Uysal, İpek Kuran, and Sinan Logie. I shared the studio’s final project, Earthbound, in a previous post. In this post, we will focus on our process-oriented midterm project named Spacebound. Topography as a Data Field In this first major phase of the “Field & Matter” studio, we examined how moving and stationary…

Last year, during the first stage of the Architectural Design Graduate project, our student team made a quick preparation and participated in the experimental works exhibition at the International Antalya Architecture Biennale (IABA 2025). This was a challenging yet educational process for our team. Using EPS foam and the robotic hotwire cutter (RHWC), a production run of 125 units, consisting of two modules (95 octahedra and 30 icosahedral units), was carried out. The icosahedral units also underwent an additional cutting…

This is the last of the site analysis tools we previously used in the midterm project of first-year architecture education. As you may recall, we previously introduced a tool that generates topographies based on specific parameters. Afterward, we examined two tools that perform slope and flow analyses on these topographies. Today, we are presenting a tool that analyzes curvature. This topic actually constitutes one of the interesting intersection points between architectural design and differential geometry. Curvature is not something architects…

We previously looked at the terrain generator script we used in midterm projects with first-year architecture students over here. Later on, we added a few analysis modules to this tool. You might remember the slope analysis tool from this link. Today’s topic is another type of analysis: flow. The idea for this code wasn’t actually mine; I developed it by looking at an existing script based on Serkan Uysal’s suggestion. Unfortunately, I don’t know who originally wrote it. Keeping track…

I previously shared the Grasshopper definition for terrain generation that we used in last year’s studio midterm. One of the goals of this project was to take the first step toward developing students’ skills in understanding, processing, and utilizing terrain data as a design input. To support this objective, we provided them with small supplementary tools. One of these tools was the slope map. As you can see, this is quite a simple Grasshopper definition. It computes the slope of…

I have been coordinating the Graduate Program in Architectural Design at Istanbul Bilgi University since last year. I would also like to note down some information about the program here. The Graduate Program in Architectural Design at İstanbul Bilgi University is positioned at the intersection of design, technology, production, and sustainability. It aims to equip designers and architects with advanced skills in computational design, coding, material research, robotics, and digital prototyping. Additionally, it introduces the fundamental principles and concepts of…

Last year, for the midterm assignment in our first-year basic design studio, we gave our students a range of different, randomly generated contexts to work with. For this purpose, I developed a small Grasshopper tool that makes the graph of a function look as much like a terrain model as possible. This tool is not really a procedural terrain generator. I would genuinely like to build one, someday. What we have here is simply a function surface. At the inputs,…

I’m looking forward to teaching Design Mathematics, a compulsory course in Istanbul Bilgi University’s graduate program in Architectural Design. The course was previously offered as an elective in the undergraduate program (here). Over time, I have also shared parts of the course content on the blog, particularly the sections on linear algebra and Rhino Python. Unfortunately, though, I have never quite managed to turn this material into the book project I had envisioned. Perhaps this semester I’ll finally make it…

This is the latest reel video of the Online Virtual Studio (OVS) project. We conducted it together with Oğulcan Üneşi and Serkan Uysal since 2022. We tried to develop a tool for online and blended education in architectural studios. The tool has specific features tailored for design studios. İstanbul Bilgi University Scientific Research Fund partially supported this project. This video showcases the latest toolset OVS provided. The tool takes some interaction concepts from gaming and incorporates them into the needs…