Reconfigurable architecture for compression-only structures

The standard way of building consists on average of 7000 parts and processes which in combination with the decrease in productivity within the construction sector limits the number of actors that can be involved. However, this leads to a housing shortage in many countries. The production of homes should be accessible, affordable and should offer a variety of housing solutions. In order to reach this the production chain of architecture must be rethought by considering design and production throughout the whole process. Modularity of discrete building blocks can be a way to reach efficient production processes as well as diverse housing solutions by means of combinatorial variations. This method has been used in pavilion and furniture designs, but only briefly for housing solutions, mostly the main references can be found in game design – such as Lego. The goal of this research is to devise a methodology to design a small set of stackable timber elements to form both a structure and the inner shells of a building that can be configured into versatile and affordable housing units using combinatorial design and compression-only structures (which is designed based on equilibrium). This leads to an accessible and open-ended building system that strives to be as simple as laying out a Lego structure.Architecture, Urbanism and Building Sciences | Explorela