Digital WoodCraft

Design and fabrication strategies based on natural wood characteristics.

The natural complex shapes and other singular characteristics found in tree trunks and branches tend to have excellent structural performance, but are often dismissed when transformed into a flat component and then again re-machined into the final product, generating additional material and energy waste. This research introduces Digital WoodCraft, an alternative design and fabrication workflow that has as a starting point found tree trunks, taken as the main component considering its unique constraints and variables for the design and the fabrication phase. Singular characteristics of each tree are used as parameters for generating the design and the assembling rules, such as grain direction, knots, branch position, specific gravity etc… In order to collect, analyse and work with such complex components, the research project explores the incorporation of 3d photogrammetric scanning techniques, parametric modeling, and robotic fabrication. With the implementation of such workflows and techniques, traditional systematised industrial manufacturing components used in construction industry can be surpassed, producing unique objects that cannot be reproduced, enabling a more efficient material use, and taking advantage of the unique structural and morphological characteristics of trees that can open a renewed agenda for constructing unique complex structure with a minimum effort.

“Digital WoodCraft” is a project of IaaC, Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia developed at Master in Advanced Architecture in 2016/2017 by:
Student: Nikolaos Argyros
Advisor: Marcos Cruz

MAAO2 Thesis Project 2016/2017.