Architecture Commons^™

Challenges To Building Sustainability; Case Study Of Green Building Implementation In Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University Bauchi, Nigeria, Sani Inusa Milala, Audu Danladi, Shuaibu H. Manga, Inusa Ibrahim

Journal of Environmental Science and Sustainable Development

Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University (ATBU) has become the tip of the iceberg since technology globalization has created a welcoming environment for green construction. However, there are several roadblocks to overcome, this includes barriers to technology. Dependence on technology stifles the autonomous growth of one's technology. This implementation of sustainable green building has been implemented in ATBU such as green construction, financing, among others. The study has the primary aim of assessing the impediment to the sustainable implementation of green building practices in ATBU. Quantitative research design is adopted in this study where questionnaire survey strategy was used to collect data. …

Dissolve Of Living Space: Living Space Under The Development Of Metaverse, Wenting Feng, Nuo Lyu

Architecture Thesis Prep

According to our vision, in the future, after the use of the metaverse becomes popular, we will spend a lot of time working, living and playing in the metaverse. The space needed in reality will be reduced by the use of the metaverse, and public buildings will be retained or not depending on the nature of the building. Because the focus of human life shifts from reality to the metaverse, energy and material consumption will also be reduced, and environmental problems can be properly alleviated. The nature in the real city will also be expanded by the reduction of the …

Mars 2100: A Microcosm Of Ecocentric Design, Andrea Hoe

Architecture Thesis Prep

In the dystopian future of 2100, Earth becomes a dying planet and humanity is forced to continue colonizing the solar system for survival. Mars develops as a colonized planet, exploited for its natural resources and potential. The hierarchical system of power seen constantly throughout Earth’s history was inescapable, and poor conditions turned to extremes. As billionaires take control of the space race, the capitalist system reflected in past company towns was implemented, making the moral questions and lines blurred.

When the system is eventually ruptured, ecosystemic living is proposed. Living is now centered around health and mindfulness, creating a system …

Immersive Inoculation: Testing If Architecture Can Become A Form Of Emotional Supplementation, Julia Kazubowsi, Chloe De Marco

Architecture Thesis Prep

The environments, objects, and spaces we encounter rub off on us, even if we don't notice. Like a human interaction, every inanimate encounter we have have with surrounding objects and architecture has a positive or negative affect on us.

We recognize that ordinary things have a surprising power to create extraordinary feelings and reactions. This thesis propose a visual medium that bridges the gap between us and the inanimate. Where we meet in the middle is an architectural experience that is emotionally charged, introducing specific emotions to the body. Just as movies, books, and happy pills elicit a response from …

Paradigm Of The Post Natural: Critiquing Capitalist Ideals Through Environmental Degradation, Andrea De Haro, Charlotte Bascombe

Architecture Thesis Prep

There is an unspoken value in the destructiveness caused by design that is exposed through the exploitation of natural resources. This thesis seeks to exemplify the aesthetic value inherent within these newly defined environments. Nature is a source for human consumption, and as such it has developed into a commodity. By now it should be made evident that humanity’s presence is everywhere. There is no ecosystem left unturned by human manipulation Iin this respect, nature is dead. Deforested sites of oil fracking leave mile long toxic ponds highlighting the destructive pursuits that capitalism creates. Chernobyl showcases how human errors in …

Assistive Intelligence: Replication And Mediation Of Modern, Madeline Alves, Kimberly Esquilin, Pramita Mital, Erin Zearfoss, Julia Kubowoski, Chloe Demarco

Architecture Thesis Prep

This project is an exploration of frames of reference that guide human authorship and how they influence machine output . “Reference frames are [used] to make predictions, create plans, and perform movements.” (Hawkins 131). We guided our exploration under the principle that if we control who authored the frames of reference that the AI receives, then that would influence the output of the machine. However, we began to question to what degree we need to control the machine in order to have a valuable output –is human-intelligent authorship necessary for machine intelligence to function productively, or is machine intelligence enough …

Eternal Imprint: Two Libraries Linked In Time, Jaifer Sultan

Architecture Thesis Prep

The thesis is an exploration of the symbolic relationship between Earth and the Moon through the conceptualization of two libraries, one on Earth and one on the Moon, are to be formally expressed through a mitosis-like interdependency, where both libraries are in constant architectural dialogue with each other despite their separation which occurred some time ago.

The thesis positions itself in the architectural discourse through the rigorous stud and analysis of the library typology throughout history, to both symbolize meaning and ritualize one's experience of acquiring knowledge. This understanding of the library typology will be tackled through the cataloging of …

Panopticon: A Privacy Revelation, Kexin Wang, Zhexu Yang

Architecture Thesis Prep

Our thesis project studies and analyzes the control of Surveillance Capitalism over people’s privacy, and how to make people realize the importance of privacy through the means of an architectural/design narrative. This concept comes from Shoshana Zuboff’s The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power, which explains how tech companies collect extra data, capture people’s behavioral surplus and sell them to third party customers, such as advertising companies, thus the predictions about people’s preferences accordingly. In this process, technology companies can make tremendous profit by stealing users’ personal information and then …

Tectonic Thresholds: Reclaiming Space Through Geomorphological Design, Amreeta Verma

Architecture Thesis Prep

This research posits that a revitalization of indigenous earth architecture practices in a contemporary context can mitigate the immense waste and embodied carbon in the construction industry. Earth materials are the focus of this research because they are locally sourced, abundantly available, and can be reused or returned to the natural environment, when utilized in a circular consumption cycle. Designing for reuse reduces the impact of construction waste on the burgeoning issue of environmental degradation and resource depletion.

The structural viability and environmental enclosure capabilities of soil throughout its lifecycle will be tested in different forms derived geomorphically from the …

The Ark: Sanctuary For Isfs, Zejun Sun, Wei Wei Li

Architecture Thesis Prep

The thesis is aiming to decrease the potential flooding damages to the ISFs, and a balance between the limited resources and high population density to relieve the flooding issues through the renovation and reconstruction of local churches in the Baseco Compound.

Flooding has become one of the most common and devastated issues in developing countries, and it is worsen by the housing crisis that lead to a formation of informal settlements with shoddy constructions and destabilized communities. What is an applicable approach to decrease the potential flooding damage to the ISFs? How to find a balance between the limited resources …

Adaptive Façades’ Technologies To Enhance Building Energy Performance And More, Kawther Ahmed Hameedaldeen, Ahmed Omar M.S. Mostafa

Emirates Journal for Engineering Research

With the increased enrolment the digital technologies and modern computer applications in AEC industry, a parallel increase and upgrade happened in the work competition leading to new benchmarks in such fields. The importance of these technologies increased with their investment of improving energy consumption in buildings, which represents a world crisis. The problem got worse in hot arid desert zones, as the case of some regions in KSA, where most users tend to spend most of their time in internal air-conditioned spaces, which led to the increase of the consumption of cooling energy, that reach 40% of the total Energy …

Role Of 3d Printed Green Walls In Healing Architecture, Sara Chahin, Ayman Afify, Hiba Mohsen, Maged Youssef

BAU Journal - Health and Wellbeing

Three-dimensional (3D) printing has become a fundamental issue in modern global technology, touching practically every element of modern human life.Three-dimensional (3D) printing (also known as additive manufacturing) is an advanced manufacturing technology that can autonomously manufacture complicated shape geometries from a 3D computer-aided design model without the use of equipment or fixtures.However, there is a friction between traditional designs and the rise of 3D printed technology when it comes to architectural healing approaches, and this adaptability is hurting human healing tactics that are dependent on the relationship between space and environment.Due to its capacity to create products in a wide …

Building Information Modeling (Bim) And Building Energy Modeling (Bem): Assessment Of Bim-Bem Workflows And Energy Simulation Tools, Mahsa Farid Mohajer

Doctoral Dissertations

Interoperability and Integration of the Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Building Energy Modeling (BEM) tools are major challenges for the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) industry. The goals of this dissertation were to (i) investigate various BEM tools to evaluate their workflow and integration with BIM and (ii) assess BEM tools’ accuracy in predicting/simulating whole building energy performance from a broader lens to a more specific one (i.e., EUI to end-use data, respectively). To conduct the research study, case study buildings were selected from various categories, representing different building types (i.e., academic, administrative, and recreational). The case study buildings were …

Visualizing The Operative And Managing Complexity: Communicating The Design-Fabrication Feedback Loop With The International Tile Industry, Josh Vermillion

Creative Collaborations

School of Architecture faculty members Joshua Vermillion and Paul Morrison led a multi-disciplinary group of students from Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Theater in a design-build elective, sponsored entirely by companies in the tile and coverings industry. The key to these sorts of collaborations between industry and academe is to see the production, fabrication, and assembly process as something that can inform design, and as a result, the design can augment production by strategic design decision-making. This feedback loop, connecting both ends of the design-production continuum, can yield interesting design research questions. One such question arose repeatedly throughout this semester of …

Robotics In Architecture <> Robotic Architecture: Why Can’T A Building Be As Smart As A Car?, Josh Vermillion

Creative Collaborations

The built environment is rich with opportunities for embedding and integrating digital technologies and sensors to create responsive and adaptable systems—to become smarter. This poster outlines selected moments from a thirteen-year body of work in research, design, and prototyping of responsive systems that act spatially with the environment at installation scale.

Robotics, sensing, physical computing, and digital fabrication are all topics that have been prioritized by U.S. funding programs such as the National Science Foundation, the Department of Defense, and the Department of Education. This poster presents the start of a framework--based around the concept of tinkering--for introducing these systems …

Iterating The Design Process Using Ai Diffusion Models, Josh Vermillion

Creative Collaborations

These studies span research and creative work to interrogate the generative capacity of text-to-image diffusion models that leverage artificial intelligence to produce architectural concepts, ideas, and imagery. These systems can generate an enormous amount of imagery in a very short amount of time based entirely from the written word, and we are still just beginning to understand how these digital tools might augment and/or disrupt, both, the design process, and design pedagogy within the discipline of architecture.

These AI models occupy a quickly evolving technology space with tremendous implications for how we design, as well as how we visualize—and verbalize—our …

Nashville Trail Of Tears Museum, Emily Schiedemeyer

Belmont University Research Symposium (BURS)

Architecture is the manifestation of artistic expression which can serve as both a storytelling device and a mechanism to evoke an intentional emotional reaction of its occupants. The Nashville Trail of Tears Memorial is intended to reflect the story of the Cherokee nation and give visitors the opportunity to consider the horrific journeys taken. The Trail of Tears was the route taken by many Native Americans following the forced displacement and ethnic cleansing of their lands, leaving many dead and families separated. Native to the southern part of the Appalachian chain, the Cherokee tribe is the group of people that …

Toward Sustainable Smart Cities: Concepts & Challenges, Nabila Al-Ghabra

Architecture and Planning Journal (APJ)

The world’s urban population is growing enormously, increasing of energy usage, air toxicity, and traffic congestion in urban areas which need a furthermost effective way for solutions. Smart city as a solution is expected to solve the functionality of urban systems. It needs to improve ICT infrastructure as an authoritative, adaptable, accessible, secure, and flexible one, and improve the quality of daily lifetime, refine citizen’s healthiness as well to achieve economic growth and develop the physical infrastructure services to promote sustainable development. This research is a narrative review, kind of methodological approach presented as open research and structured as follows: …

Design, Integration, And Evaluation Of Iot-Based Electrochromic Building Envelopes For Visual Comfort And Energy Efficiency, Qingqing Sun

All Dissertations

Electrochromic glazing has been identified as the next-generation high-performance glazing material for building envelopes due to its dynamic properties, which allow the buildings to respond to various climate conditions. IoT technologies have improved the sensing, communication, and interactions of building environmental data. Few studies have been done to synthesize the advancements in EC materials and building IoT technologies for better building performance. The challenge remains in the lack of compatible design and simulation tools, limited understanding of integration, and a paucity of evaluation measures to support the convergence between the EC building envelopes and IoT technologies. This research first explores …

“Top Trends And Challenges Of Digital Technologies To Enhance The Efficiency Of Building Thermal Insulation And The Reality Of Its Application In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia”, Abrar Nasser Hamdi, Ahmed Omar M.S. Mostafa

Emirates Journal for Engineering Research

تشكل التقنيات الرقمية إحدى أهم مظاهر التقدم الحضاري في القرن الحادي والعشرين والتي اثرت بشكل كبير علـى النتاج المعماري تصميماً وانشاءً سواء على مستوى تقنيات المواد، أو تقنيات التطبيقات الرقمية أو تقنيات الأجهزة الإلكترونية الرقمية التي تساعد في تحسين أداء المباني عموماً ورفع كفاءة أداء العزل الحراري على وجه الخصوص. وعلى الرغم من انتشار تطبيق تقنيات مواد البناء في العديد من المجالات التي ترتبط بالعزل الحراري الى جانب تطبيقها وقياس ادائها باستخدام بالتقنيات الرقمية في أغلب الدول المتقدمة، الا انها لم تصل الى المستوى المأمول في السوق المحلي بالمملكة وهو ما يمثل إشكالية البحث الرئيسية. ويهدف البحث إلى استكشاف أهم …

Trends And Challenges Of Parametric Design Techniques In Design Concepts Evaluation & Development, And Its Application In Riyadh, Albaraa Ibraheem Ghabban, Ahmed Omar M.S. Mostafa

Emirates Journal for Engineering Research

The continuous development and transformation of modeling and design techniques and tools lead to the emergence of more efficient techniques that support the architects through the design process. In light of that, the parametric design field is considered a state-of-art of such techniques that could support architects in making the most suitable and effective design decisions in early design stages by testing a large number of design solutions and alternatives using computational models. When considering the tendency of KSA, within its vision 2030, to digital transformation and increase the digital applications in all fields, the lack of sufficient data about …

Sage Garden Pavilion Shade Structure, Anthony Razouk Karroum, Manuel Bermudez, Matthew Kilbride, Sarah Holt, Marisa Martineau

Architectural Engineering

Form finding, testing, and construction of funicular double-layered shells in an interdisciplinary format with a focus on designing a shade structure for the San Luis Obispo Botanical Garden Children’s Pavilion. In the process, challenges such as connection design, materiality, storage, and more are explored and refined in relation to shell structures.

How Can Biomimicry Inform A Sustainable, Ethical Future In Architecture And Design?, Chloe Hanf

University Honors Theses

This publication traces effects of systems theory and assemblage thinking on American architecture and design since the 1960's in relation to contemporary ecological thought and biological discoveries. Building upon these observations, the author concludes that biomimicry belongs at the forefront of contemporary theory and praxis in architecture and design.

Caed Hasslein Student Competition, Greta R. Stout

Construction Management

This paper outlines the development of the first CAED Hasslein Student Competition at Cal Poly, SLO. The College of Architecture and Environmental Design at Cal Poly, SLO has not yet been successful in creating a platform to engage students of all five majors to collaborate in an educational atmosphere. This project aims to challenge students to work in teams made up of all five disciplines in a Request for Proposal-style competition. This paper focuses on how the idea of this competition came to be and the steps that were taken to successfully write the competition problem statement. These steps included …

Beirut's Burden, Joelle Osta

Bachelor of Architecture Theses - 5th Year

This is a proposal for a waste management facility to be built in the busy city of Beirut to educate the public and prevent further damage to the environment‭.‬

This facility collects‭, ‬transports‭, ‬processes‭, ‬recycles‭, ‬and monitors waste materials from both businesses and private residences‭. ‬There is a sorting and processing wing to separate waste into different categories‭. ‬

Proper incineration of certain types of waste will generate green energy and the gases emitted from the decomposition of trash in landfills can be used as a renewable energy source‭. ‬Through the use of extremely high temperatures‭, ‬trash is converted into …

A Performance Evaluation Of Architectural Coatings To Preserve Aerosol Paint On Concrete, Riley Morris

All Theses

The growing movement of assigning cultural and heritage value to graffiti and street art is one without a preservation solution to ensure the longevity of these works in-situ in an outdoor environment. The goal of this thesis was to provide a comprehensive evaluation of six architectural topcoats’ performance when applied as a conservation treatment to outdoor aerosol graffiti and street art on concrete substrate. An artist’s quality, durable, color-fast spray-paint was applied to twenty-eight concrete test panels to mimic the application of graffiti or street art. Six topcoats, Prosoco SC-1, Prosoco Gloss n’ Guard WB, Keim Faceal Oleo HD®, Keim …

Plastic Bottles In Architecture: A How To Guide On Life-Cycle Through Reuse, Crystallyne Landram

Architecture Undergraduate Honors Theses

This booklet is a collection of 6 case studies that utilize reused plastic bottles significantly within their design. Prior to working with the case studies, much time was dedicated to research that justified the need for such a project. In-depth research on the environmental crisis, waste management trends, stewardship, sustainability, and ethics was conducted and recorded in the introduction to contextualize the need for an accessible how-to guide such as this one. Time was also given to establishing background information on bottles, reprocessing, and architecture to elaborate further on each piece of the content matter. It is curated as a …

The Future Of Urban Technology: Exploring Smart Cities And Transportation Through Game Theory And Scenario Planning, Matthew Wilson

Architecture Undergraduate Honors Theses

Technological innovation is occurring at a rapid pace in the world of personal devices. This trend of change has not been able to occur as fast in the city infrastructure. Consumers are curious about the next generation of technology and the integration of artificially intelligent technology in transportation and the urban fabric. In this project, I study the motivations and values of a set of characters involved in the integration and innovation of Smart City Technology. These characters create potential future scenarios of the city from their actions and reactions to specific decisions.

This body of work can provide a …

U.S. Army Medical Command’S Medical Treatment Facilities’ Response To Sars-Cov-2 (Covid-19), Seyedmohammad Ahmadshahi

All Theses

Starting in December 2019 to the current time in May 2022, COVID-19 was a devastating pandemic with approximately 440 million cases and 6 million deaths worldwide (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2021). The United States (US) with roughly 90 million cases and 1 million deaths (CDC, 2021) was one of the epicenters of the outbreak since the beginning. The pandemic has significantly impacted the health systems across the US with unpredictable surges of highly infectious patients with uncertain symptomology and acuity levels, requiring isolation and critical level of care (Brambilla et al., 2021).

Based on the findings from …

Electrochromic Windows: Return On Investment Analysis, Thomas Michael Caprio

Construction Management

In recent years, sustainability in construction has become a topic of undeniable interest. With sustainability certifications becoming more prominent and desirable, members of the construction industry have begun to seek alternatives for standard systems to keep up with market trends. One of the main issues that the construction industry faces is accessibility of technology. While there are new products and technologies being released frequently, members of the construction industry lack knowledge on the specific details and implications of working with newer systems. One piece of technology that was recently introduced is electrochromic glass, or smart glass. Electrochromic windows analyze sunlight …