The facade
Designed and constructed by Elegant Embellishments in 2013, the new facade of the Hospital Manuel Gea Gonzalez in Mexico City works actively to remove smog from around the building. The facade is comprised by Prosolve 370e tiles, a material that has a superfine coating of titanium dioxide, a photocatalytic substance that captures and neutralizes the smog particles. This process requires sunlight and, for this reason, the form of the tiles was optimized in order to receive the maximum possible amount of sunlight all along its’ surface. It utilizes a biomimetic pattern, derived from sponges and corals. This pattern was designed using Rhino.
Clusters of tiles were assembled on the ground and then mounted on a vertical grid with other clusters, directly on the facade.
Credits: Elegant Embellishments
Project Brief
This project attempts to recreate the facade of the Hospital Manuel Gea Gonzalez through the use of CNC. The aim of the project is to offer an understanding of the digital fabrication strategies, tools, and material properties necessary when working with a CNC machine.
Fabrication Process
Strategy
Rhino Cam Simulation
CNC milling
Model assembly
Final Model
Video
</p>
Video created as an assignment for the Computational Design I course.
Parametric Skins // Hospital Manuel Gea González Facade is a project of IAAC, Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia developed in the Master of Advanced Architecture 2020/21 by Students: Christos Trompoukis, Kajal Unahariya, Ziyad Wassef and Faculty: Ricardo Mayor Luque, Lana Awad and Shyam Zonca