PREVIOUS WORKhellojam.es - [email protected] - @jamesmcbennett - skype: ‘jamesmcbennett” - UK +447972835054 - IRL +353879784854
2135, London HouseGoodenoughCollege
Mecklenburgh SquareLondon
WC1N 2AB
James McBennett
2009-2011
Architectural AssociationExtreme Environment + Composite Materiality (Lundberg/Yau)
Flow / Networks (BELKIND)Interrelation of Component and System (HAGERMANN)Myths + Theories of Sustainable Architecture (YANNUS)
The Possibility of an Absolute Architecture (AURELLI) Technology Transfer / Technomimetics (NOEL)
Processing + Coding (MAXWELL)Grasshopper/Ansys/Ecotect (MAMOU-MANU/SKORICK)
D_LAB Digital Fabrication (CROLLA / VAN AMEIJDE)Interaction Design (RANDOM INTERNATIONAL)
‘BRICK’ Get brick ready for the 10,000 birthday catching up on no innovation to the shape of bricks throughout 9500 years.
7500 MUDBRICKS SYRIA
4000 SUN-DRIED BRICK MESOPOTAMIA
1000 BAKED BRICKS CHINA
BC
AD1880 FACTORY BRICKS ENGLAND
1931 STEEL-REINFORCED BRICKWORK CHRYSLER BUILDING - 319m
1950 COMPRESSED-EARTH BLOCK CHRYSLER BUILDING - 319m
Get brick ready for the 10,000 birthday catching up on no innovation to the shape of bricks throughout 9500 years.
If we increased six sided bricks to tweve sided bricks...
SIXTY SIDES Virtually controlled bricks can be drawn easily today.
VIRTUAL POINTS MATERIAL BRICKSVIRTUAL SURFACES
but handcut clay is not accurate enough.
Natural High researches 3D printed bricks made from a ubiquitous construction material with low embodied-energy. Taking Ciudad Nezahualcóyotl (Neza) in East Mexico City for research, digitally generated mud bricks are reinforced with bamboo fibre and tested for towers and courtyard blocks at unprecedented heights to previous use of the material.
As large numbers of rural Mexicans migrated to informal Neza throughout the 20th century, Mexico City enlarged to one of the world’s largest urban areas, a phenomenal growth with severe environmental consequences. Over-extraction of groundwater resulted in depleting the aquifer causing land subsidence and intermittent water supplies. Unregulated factories and intensive car usage cause unfavourable health effects, residents have forever lost their sense of smell. Threats arise of earthquakes from the Guerrero Seismic Gap and volcanic activity from ‘El Popo’. Ricky Burdett is pessimistic about Mexico City’s environmental impact, ‘extends endlessly in all directions like an oil-spill, has no chance of becoming sustainable.’ Two million citizens of Neza created the city using self-builders without the knowledge to face these important issues, but can now implement change, empowering all residents to rebuild a better city, stronger, denser with less resource consumption, simultaneously strengthening communities and increasing quality of life.
Mud is cheap, abundant, recyclable, everlasting and thermally suitable making it an excellent building material, now testing suitability for use in the city. 3D printing is explored as a zero-waste addictive production process to produce new forms of bricks to allow stronger, lighter, interlocking masonry, using solid/voids in the wall for rainwater harvesting, nighttime cooling and formwork for concrete strengthing alike the Quetta Bond in Pakistan used after their earthquake in 1926. Bamboo fibre is placed between the bricks making a strong tissue-like masonry. Spatial solutions see cars no longer dominant with public transport serving the peripheries of large walk-able clusters within a sustainable mega-city. Former roads are replaced with alternative uses for community-use. This project is relevant for a world dealing with the end of an energy boom and expanding informal cities where economy of construction and building performance gain favour.
3D PRINTED BRICK Asking brick a question...
Dear Brick,
I received your contact details from the great architect Louis Kahn who famously asked you at University of Pennsylvania, “What do you want, brick?”
Large numbers migrated to informal cities throughout the 20th century, ushering a new age of the world’s largest urban sprawls, a phenomenal growth with severe environmental consequences. Informal dwellers are unable to build homes more than three floors, thus spreading certain city boundaries more than 20 km in every direction. Mexico City is an example of this unmanageable growth that Ricky Burdett (LSE Urban Age) has described as “extends endlessly in all directions like an oil-spill … has no chance of becoming sustainable”.
For 9,500 years you have had six sides. Opportunity exists to upgrade yourself with as many sides as a material can tolerate. Mud is cheap, abundant, recyclable, everlasting and thermally suitable for comfort. 3D printing is a zero-waste addictive process that will allow the production of new forms that are cheaper, stronger, lighter and more intelligent than previous construction. The informal city can rise safe against disaster.
Therefore I ask you a new question, what form would you like to to be, brick?
Using the web to spread this “form” throughout the world, the disruption is not intended to change one billion people in cities like London and New York, but to introduce architecture, engineering and urban design to five billion people that have never seen it before.
Look forward to your response,
James.
Subj: Question
Varying Internal Structure of Bricks
Heavyi - Base of buildingii - High forces
Medium Lighti - Top of buildingii - Low forces
WALL Fibre reinforment through brickworks creates a tissue -like strength
Walls can be articulated to capture and store water.
Distorted Vaults
Arrangemnt of of four sided and seven sided vaults.
ThreeSides
FourSides
Five Sides
Six Sides
SevenSides
SevenSides
VAULTS New forms of vaulting
Vaults push air and water through building, providing social space at front.
CAN SELF BUILDERS CREATE A CITY?
CAN SELF BUILDERS REINVENT THE CITY?
11km 40km 2
7km
CAR
REPA
IRCA
R PA
RTS
TYRE
SAUTO
FOOD
+ H
OME
RECR
EATI
ON
MEDI
CAL
CONS
UMER
EDUC
ATIO
N
PETR
OL
GROC
ERIE
SSU
PERM
ARKE
T
REST
AURA
NT
HAIR
DRES
SERS
DOCT
OR
CLOT
HES
ELEC
TRON
ICS
FURN
ITUR
EHA
RDW
ARE
SCHO
OLCR
ECHE
STAT
IONA
RY
PROF
ESSI
ONA
LOF
FICE
ACCO
UNTA
CYSO
ME
DENT
IST
PHAR
MACY
HOSP
ITAL
FOOD
BAR/
OFF
LICE
NCE
CLUB
(POO
L/CO
MEDY
)
BICY
CLE
LAUN
DRY
/CLE
ANIN
GW
ATER
AA OPTI
CIEN
GIFT
SBA
NK
TOY
S
INTE
RNET
/PRI
NTIN
G
LEGA
LAR
CHIT
ECT
RELI
GION
CHUR
CH
ACCO
UNTA
CYST
ATIO
NARY
LEGA
L
11km 40km 2
7km
CAR REPAIR
CAR PARTS
TYRESAUTO
FOOD + HOME
RECREATION
MEDICAL
CONSUMER
EDUCATION
PETROL
GROCERIES
SUPERMARKET
RESTAURANT
HAIRDRESSERS
DOCTOR
CLOTHES
ELECTRONICS
FURNITURE
HARDWARE
SCHOOL
CRECHE
STATIONARY
PROFESSIONAL
OFFICE
ACCOUNTACY
SOME
DENTIST
PHARMACY
HOSPITAL
FOOD
BAR/OFF LICENCE
CLUB (POOL/COMEDY)
BICYCLE
LAUNDRY/CLEANING
WATER
AA OPTICIEN
GIFTS
BANK
TOYS
INTERNET/PRINTING
LEGAL
ARCHITECT
RELIGION
CHURCH
ACCOUNTACY
STATIONARY
LEGAL
MEXICO Case study: Diversity in Neza, can we make the existing even better?
Expansion of Neza, East Mexico City
Division of blocks in approx.9m x 15m
30m
15m
9m1
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9m 9m 9m9m 9m 9m 9m9m 9m 9m 9m9m 9m 9m 9m9m 9m 9m 9m9m 9m 9m 9m 9m
15m
225m
4,000 Hectares/40,000,000m Division in "Megablocks" by Primary Axis(very roughly 1km x 1km)
Public Spaces assigned towards centre
3m
1.2m 1.2m
10 metre wide Local Roads (3/4 of all total roads)
20 metre wide Secondary Roads
40 metre wide Primary Roads
2m 2m
3m
18.5m
14m
7.6m
10m 10m
EMBODIED LANDSCAPES MRI Data becomes design data
EMBODIED LANSCAPES A fusion of voxel-based inside-out medical approaches in virtual environments with the traditional exuberance of the Euclidean geometries.
Studing Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) as a vital tool in diagnosis, research and visualization in medicine. This non-invasive investigation of the body yields a digital reproduction by measuring the relative densities of the body. Rather than the 2-D pixel representing pictorial space, the ‘voxel’ is used to visualize and inform space in three dimensions adding properties allowing the fusion of densities with space. The projected voxel-body is generated through fields of density and viscosity that imply the merging of ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ space disregarding boundaries and hence allowing for a surgeon or architect to interface between actual/virtual and densities of matter/space.
PARAMETRIC DESIGN Learning Grasshopper for Rhino3D
Exploring Beijing, we found several fascinating characteristics within the Hutong that primarily focused on the courtyard building type. We were particularly interested in the ability to read the history and its current usage of the courtyard buildings, as well as the destruction of the void. We would like to retain self-sufficiency of the Hutong districts and like to address the loss of the intimate human scale of the Hutong which is becoming increasingly threatened due to the rise of the automobile.
Through utilizing the void as the driving force of the urban fabric, we are aiming to return the spatial link to the court-yard. This is achieved through an offset function to blur the solid and void relationship and reintroduce the courtyard back into the Hutong. This logic of offsetting will also allow for future flexibility without losing the courtyard, and taking advantage of the voids cooling properties.
COLLABORATION WITH TSINGHUA UNIVERSITY, BEIJING
The issue of density within the Hutong was the ultimate destruction of the void due to the lack of buildable space. Therefore, to avoid this problem re-occurring vertical offsetting should be considered; to create a vertical solid/void relationship. This should occur to the perimeter of the Hutong urban grid, stacking the density to where the infrastruc-ture is largest and the human scale is not as significant.
Offsetting the courtyard becomes the driving tool for the urban fabric; this is achieved through the shifting of the existing courtyard and courtyard structures, breaking up the voids and associated solids into a smaller organiza-tion, thus blurring the distinction between the two. This aims to provide access to the courtyards for all residents living within the Hutong.
Parametric Urban Planning
+ + Experience2007-2009
KAL_Kalvebrod Bridge, DenmarkALB_Albenga Marina, ItalyEUR_Europan Housing Competition, IrelandORD_Ordos Big Brother House, MongoliaNOR_Nordhavn, DenmarkTNT_Tour de Taxi, BelgiumERA_Eraclea Marina, ItalyNOR_Hollmenkollen Ski Jump
Education City HQ, QatarPrada Transformer, S.Korea (assisted with 3D modeling + geometry only)
Smithfield Market, LondonWorld Trade Centre, DohaMGM Hotel (7*), Abu DhabiKutzovskiy, Moscow
PROTOTYPING IDEAS IN BLUE FOAM
TOUR DE TAXI, BRUSSELS Produced the first 3D Print at JDS
KALVEBROD BRYGGE Final models in Rhino, Physical and Photoshop
HOLMENKOLLEN SKI JUMP Oslo, Norway
EDUCATION CITY HQ, Internal Rendering and Ground Floor Plan
CORK SCHOOL
University College Dublin2004-2007 UNDERGRADUATE
+
THESIS PROJECT: DOUBLE HELIX LIBRARY
NOISY
=SILENT HYBRID
INTELLIGENT SHELVING
CLASSROOMS OF THE FUTURE
Additional Information
TED2012 FULL SPECTRUM FINALIST HELD IN NYC
Presenting brick’s 10,000 birthday surprise present
OPEN-WATER SWIMMING Channel Swim Dover to Calais in Sept ‘11
TEACHING “FAB LAB” ‘09 UCD “Now What?”
GoodenoughCollege
PHOTOGRAPHY Monocylist outside Monde d’Arabe, Paris
That thin slice of shelf that faces consumers with analogue pricing information can be brought into the 21st century as a read/write communication between man and food. A new potential to display data about food far beyond price.
Following on from Tom Hulme’s idea “Window to the farm” I have looked into modifying the supermarket shelf. A touchscreen would create a rich media platform for consumers and producers to have a conversation.
Price is the default display, but upon touching the screens one see more information, changing the display of the individual product, or the entire food group on the shelves. For example, a customer might switch the displays from price to ‘distance traveled to market’ changing the entire shelf to temporarily display miles, not price.
DISPLAY OPTIONS1. Customer feedback and comments.2. Like buttons.3. Share this product on your facebook/twitter.4. Price HistoryONLINE COLLOBORATION5. (@Meena Kadri) Nutritional Comparison between products6. (@Meena Kadri) Goes Well With... (customer vetted?)7. (@Meena Kadri) Hyper-local Index (yet to be invented? but to include distance, collaboration between producers, *local* recycle, repurpose, up-cycling, etc)8.(@Meena Kadri)Search a specific shelf for a particular ingredient. (Useful for those with Allergies.)9.(@Arjan Tupan) Foorprint: http://openideo.com/open/localfood/concepting/what-s-the-foodprint/10: Third party recommendations. What does the Guardian Newspaper or Jamie Oliver recommend or the Goodguide.
ONLINE COLLOBORATION