#390 - From Idea to Execution: Heliomorphism – Archispeak

Sven Shockey, FAIA joins Evan and Cormac to talk about Virginia Tech Academic Building One — a 300,000-square-foot computer science and computer engineering building on a new campus in Alexandria, Virginia whose faceted, photovoltaic-integrated form was derived through 1,400 computational iterations. They explore what it means to design a building's exterior before the interior program is finalized, how three distinct types of building-integrated photovoltaics get assigned to 17 different facades based on orientation and performance data, and what a sewage wastewater energy exchange system has to do with a tunnel under a parking lot.

This episode is especially relevant for design architects and architecture students who want to understand how computational tools actually interact with design judgment — and for anyone who's ever wondered what it looks and feels like to sit inside a building where the facade is doing real work. The shadows move. The light is soft. The algorithm found a non-intuitive answer, and then the real design work began.

Episode Links

Guest

SmithGroup

Virginia Tech Academic Building One

Awards

Context: Virginia Tech & Amazon HQ2

Virginia Tech Innovation Campus key to attracting Amazon HQ2 — Virginia Tech News

Related Work: DC Water Headquarters

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Poddgruvan

#390 - From Idea to Execution: Heliomorphism

Episode Links

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