Patrik Schumacher talks to London Live about the work of Zaha Hadid Computation and Design Research Group (ZHCODE) on display in the Digital Turn exhibition at The Building Centre. The projects exhibited are examples of ZHCODE's development of 'very organic new forms, new materials and the involvement of robots, but also the intelligence of arranging spaces in urban patterns.'
The exhibition showcases experiments in robotic fabrication with examples of hotwire cutting and robotic printing. It also presents for the first time the group’s models of data driven and algorithmically designed housing typologies. Responding to the increasing complexity of space, Schumacher explains that the work seeks to see urban environments ‘more intelligently arranged.’
‘You can see that the forms are quite curved, organic, intricate, so they can fit better into complex environments. They are designed through algorithms and are executed through robotic fabrication. That is why they can be very precise, but also very complex and intricate. Yet they can be made very economically because there is not much human labour involved anymore.’
‘It’s about coming closer together and living in a more sophisticated and intricate way. And about being more mobile – instead of spreading out into suburbs’.
Highlighting the relevance of the exhibition to a wide audience Schumacher notes, ‘this is The Building Centre. It is for professionals, architects, young architects and also students, design students and a general cultural audience who is interested in new developments in the arts and sciences, design and architecture.’
Zaha Hadid Computation and Design Research Group (ZHCODE) is the second 'turn' in the Digital Turn exhibition series, on show now at The Building Centre.
