About

This year DS18 embarked upon a new chapter centred around the concept of emergence, aiming to forefront process driven design methodologies across morphodynamic and morphogenetic approaches, for the generation of landscape and architectural form. Students were tasked to develop their generative workflows from a study of the systems and material processes of their subject, integrated and adaptable to the dynamic conditions of its environment, whilst developed through experimentation, simulation and computation. We saw this as a fluid, abstracted and non-linear approach, where the design of the design process was as critical as the architectural outcome itself.

Based within the Fenlands in east England, our sites sat suitably between the tensions of Earth’s natural processes and anthropogenic control. Caught between river surges from the highlands and rising sea levels at the coastal wash, the overlapping Fenland networks cross cultures, economies and ecologies and balance on the precipice of local- and globally-scaled critical climatic thresholds. Our reading of this landscape was supported by a study trip to the Netherlands, once topographically linked to the Fens, to witness their history and mastery of natural systems control, and visiting colleagues at MIT’s Sensible Cities Labs, Amsterdam, TU Delft, Rotterdam and Eindhoven.

After further investigation into the sites, students abstracted their systems and flows into their foundational components – conditions, forces and parameters. We isolated and tested their variables to understand specific impacts, logics and behaviours over time, while recording, evaluating and feeding back into our iterative and interactive workflows. Finally, we tailored and deployed our generative procedures back on to site, to witness landscape and architectures that emerged and flourished amongst their environment, informing intelligent yet unpredictable outcomes, appropriate and adaptive to the uncertainty and

See Past Studios:

2022-2023: Thermal Domains, UK
2021-2022: Climate Futures, Dungeness
2020-2021: Carbon Transitions, UK
2019-2020: +Other Climates, Norway

Guest Critics

Thanks to:
Andrea Rossi, University of Kassel
Andreas Körner, Bartlett UCL
Andy Bow, Foster + Partners
Dhruv Gulabchande, HFM Architects & Narrative Practice
Emma Colthurst, Bartlett UCL
Emma Kate Matthews, Bartlett UCL
Finbar Charleson, dRMM
Fraser Morrison, Farshid Moussavi Architecture
George Malliaropoulos, Populous
Guy Sinclair, Doctoral Researcher & Weber Industries
Justin Nicholls, Fathom Architects
Katya Bryskina, IM-A Studio
Lucia Rebolino, Forensic Architecture
Mitesh Dixit, DOMAIN Office & Pratt SOA
Sabina Blasiotti, Sabi Studio

Site

Students

Year 1

Beca Ellis
Bradley Fletcher
Hannah Ismail
Isabel Atkinson
Kristina Veleva
Muhammad Shaukat Ali
Sarah Gardner
Shaima Al-Jalal
Tessa Cox
Tobias Hobbs
Valeria Golban

Year 2

Adam Din
Alistair Orchard-Mitchell
Diana Fox
Naomi Punnett
Ollie Astley
Tiffany Yao