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Chapter 6
Dynamic Generative Systems:
Simple Parametric Strategies for Complex
Architectural Objects and Spaces

Mauro Chiarella
Universidad Nacional del Litoral, Argentina

Matias Dalla Costa

Universidad Nacional del Litoral, Argentina

ABSTRACT
This chapter describes that in recent decades, international architecture has used complex geometric
systems and experimented widely with building form in an attempt to integrate new concepts and techno-
logical tools into spatial exploration. These design processes put forward non-linear multiplicity as an
alternative to traditional design methods. The forms and spaces conceived arise out of design approaches
whose results are more characteristic of the process itself than of the adoption of compositional categories
(order, type, element) or functional-rational categories (system, typology, structure). Parametric design
is an algorithmic mathematical technique that enables the user to alter determined characteristics of
the model at any point in the process without having to recalculate other characteristics that would be
affected by such changes. Dynamic generative systems are a vehicle for thought that can be modified
and interrelated over time. Their principles are closer to dynamic performance, contextual adaptability
and interface and open processes than to the definition of simple finished objects

INTRODUCTION

In recent decades, international architecture has used complex geometric systems and experimented
widely with building form in an attempt to integrate new concepts and technological tools into spatial
exploration. These design processes put forward non-linear multiplicity as an alternative to traditional
design methods. The forms and spaces conceived arise out of design approaches whose results are
more characteristic of the process itself (indices, distances between moments, transitions, movements,
displacements) than of the adoption of compositional categories (order, type, element, superposition)
or functional-rational categories (system, typology, structure).
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-3993-3.ch006

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Dynamic Generative Systems

As spatial organization increases in complexity it becomes forced and inadequate to think of and
describe it in terms of the traditional systems of geometric representation (parallel projections, Monge
system) inherited from the industrial revolution. Classical orthographic projections limit the formal
possibilities arising from a more complex compression of space, which can no longer be summarized in
simple transversal and longitudinal descriptions of form using elevations, plans and sections.
Any early incorporation of parametric design would demand a review of current design processes
to include concepts and dynamic variables from relational data. Parametric design is an algorithmic
mathematical technique that enables the user to alter determined characteristics of the model at any
point in the process without having to recalculate other characteristics that would be affected by such
changes. It thus becomes a powerful tool for developing a codified (modifiable and adaptable) system
able to automatically detect and assess a family of alternatives to the proposed problem in real time and
according to pre-established parameters. Its use demands a change in mentality where space and objects
fit into a new way of seeing the world that focuses on efficiency and adaptability. Dynamic generative
systems are a vehicle for thought that can be modified and interrelated over time. Their principles are
closer to dynamic performance, contextual adaptability and interface and open processes than to the
definition of simple finished objects.

Project Design Thinking in Architecture

Architecture, as a profession in the contemporary world, is a multiple, diverse, complex and contradic-
tory practice, its limits, set by a variety of economic, political and social interests and pressures. The
figure of the architect takes on multiple images in contemporary society: successful businessperson, chief
of a specific part of a large company, director of a public department, independent professional with
individual clients; art consultant and critic, interdisciplinary team coordinator, employee, unemployed
person, cyberspace artist. Each one represents different degrees of worth, incumbency and recognition
in professional, economic and cultural terms. This makes very difficult to use principles and parameters
to organize and evaluate the wide range of outputs from the different profiles and circumstances. The
impossibility of imposing any single validation system on such diverse situations has marked contem-
porary project teaching practice in faculties and schools of architecture.
The emphasis on project design in architecture teaching corresponds to the adoption of territorial plan-
ning methods and strategies, formalization of professional responsibility and the establishment of legal
mechanisms for practice in both the public and private sectors. Planned organization of habitable space
in contemporary societies arises with the passage from pre-modern to modern social states. Architecture,
as a modern profession, is regulated by rationalist and functionalist postulates (i.e., mechanisms that
regulate and control habitable space), which usually advocate a homogeneous built environment for the
masses. Most architectural design projects teaching in our academic communities are developed under
these epistemological, philosophical and instrumental constructs (with their indisputable values and
recognized shortcomings). Representation and simulation tools, with all their potential and limitations
for understanding geometric form and space, are essential elements in the production of the architectural
object both as an historical event and a cultural deed. The conception of space, the notion of spatiality
that each geometric system stipulates and realizes is a fundamental condition of the paradigm of the
times, determining the certainties, doubts and uncertainties of the thinking of each period of history.

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Figure 1. Mapping of experienced design processes: RI.Lab (Representation and Ideation Laboratory
2010/16), MADPRO-UBioBio, Taller Cero-UBioBio (2006, MECESUP-Chile); UNISINOS (2006, AE-
Brasil); TGD-UNL (2006/07/08/09/10, Ar); UTFSM (2011/13, Chile); POLIMI (2012, Italia); UAH
(2012, España); UCuenca (2013/15, Ecuador).

Graphic Thinking: Geometry and Spatial Representation

The world is visually understood and represented thanks to geometry. Throughout history, mathematics
and art, designers have represented the world and sought to come to know and re-invent it by generating
new forms using the logical principles given by this science of form and space.
Geometry is characterized by a high degree of abstraction. This abstraction has enabled designers
to formulate ideal notions that lead them to invent new worlds on top of the material world, which pro-
vides the inspiration for such representations. Geometry not only provides an access to reality; it allows
to participate in and reinvent it. It takes its place between perception and the concepts it creates. It is
possible to see geometry as the key strategic tool for ordering reality, the reality of a world that escapes
our sight and limitations.

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Geometry proposes a way of seeing and knowing form and space, providing with concepts that allow
to understand the complicated visual reality of the spatial structure and the forms it contains. In this
way, the capacity is generated to translate any image into thought and any thought into image. Western
thinking linked to the creation of form and space has historically developed conditioned and strengthened
by this initial way of seeing and formulating the world put forward by geometry.
By tracing the different theoretical postulates, it is possible to understand how thinking has evolved
and developed and, in consequence, how the visible world has been interpreted in such a way as to enable
our participation with creative design potential through using both the analytical method and sensory
perception. In this way, geometry constitutes the way designers think about reality and perfects human
intervention.
In terms of meaning, the word ‘geometry’ originates from the Greek language, equating to ‘measure-
ment of the earth’ (from geo –earth- and metria, measurement). Since it is an object of thinking, it is by
nature abstract and deductive. Despite its etymological origin and the fact it is considered a science, in
ancient thought its place lay in its pragmatic use (as a technical resource for practical application) and
it had already appeared (in Mesopotamia and Egypt) centuries before the Greeks began to define its
principles. The deductive approach only began to be informed by the mathematical sciences in 300BC,
with the work of Archimedes and Euclid and the scientific developments in Alexandria. Since then, the
aims of geometry were no longer only direct application of its practice but also the study and under-
standing of natural phenomena and their forms through the creation of a synthetic and analytic model
of the real world.
Euclid (c.300BC) wrote down the fundaments of Greek geometry, regrouping the knowledge of the
epoch through deductive systematization of the method from a geometric perspective in his work “The
Elements of Geometry”. This work, made up of thirteen books, is based on definitions, postulates and
axioms that set out the development and construction of geometric shapes, propose their properties
and define these properties in space (Euclidean space). Euclidean space is infinite, wherein any finite
homogenous straight line with a specific direction can be extended continuously in that direction, since
no displacement occurs to modify it. Euclidean geometry provides a synthetic and analytic model of the
real world that has dominated western thought for centuries, with everything that coincides with this
model being considered valid, true and absolute. The logical coherence of the Euclidean system has
led to it being considered the only model, both in science and in art. Both disciplines have depended
on Euclidean geometry to grasp real space since it provides a clear and coherent unity between three-
dimensional space, volume and surface.

Plan, Module and Proportion

Since antiquity, geometry has come to be seen as the most powerful tool for conceiving and project-
ing architecture. The application of the geometric universe within our discipline must be interpreted
as a resource to guarantee optimal form and better organizational patterns are achieved, thus ensuring
technological systematization and constructive rigor. Functional, technological, symbolic and cultural
aspects are upheld by geometric logic that is modified according to changes or ruptures in our ways of
thinking, doing and designing the human environment in response to cultural and temporal parameters.
In this way, the architects of antiquity, especially the Greeks, bequeathed a totally original way of
designing architecture based on a modular system. The classical orders are a synthesis of interconnected
geometric form and relationship that enabled the work of architecture to be revealed as a system of in-

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terlinked measurements. The classical elements are defined by the geometric relationship between their
parts and the whole from which the modular system arises, expressed by a geometric grid.
The regulating grid continued to be determinant in architecture up until the industrial revolution.
Although the ancient system of proportions was recovered in the Renaissance and then lost importance
once again in modern times, the modular concept as a basis for the rationalization of form continued to
impose itself for many centuries. For example, the modular proportional systems based on the golden
section have been fundamental both in classicism and in twentieth century architecture. Greek temples,
Palladian villas and works by Le Corbusier were all generated under the same mechanics. Brunelleschi
even applied the modular order as the geometric solution to the central plan of his domes, thereby rescu-
ing technical solutions from the medieval world.
Vitruvius, the first Roman architect, was trained in Euclid’s “The Elements” and was the first to write
in Latin about applying Euclid’s postulates to architecture. His work, “The Ten Books of Architecture”,
represents the keys to the classical system, from which the truth and coherence of a complete universal
theory is derived. Through the testimony of Greek ruins and fundamental postulates, he affirms the ne-
cessity of orders in studies on proportion and defines his concepts on order and composition: order arises
out of arithmetic and composition out of geometry. The agreement between the two gives designers a
relationship: proportion. Scale is built up out of these two elements and becomes the controlled use of
ruler and compass on a surface onto which the building form is described and designed.
The plan is understood as a general system of measurements referring to a basic unit, which guides the
decision regarding the appropriate measurement for each part and piece. The module is the system basic
unit, established on the basis of its pieces; out of this module, proportion arises as a metric relationship
between the parts. Plan, module and proportion are the first resources used in architecture based on the
consolidation of geometry as the fundamental instrument for thinking and prefiguring architectural form
and organization as an integrated, coherent and harmonious whole.

Treaties: Design and Perspective

Since the end of the Trecento, the artist-architect has been using observation and study to build a design
methodology with graphic and geometric processes in representation and construction systems. For the
Italian Renaissance treaties writers, the concept of design meant “drawing in the creative act” as the
center of a rational and analytical construction used by all the arts: architecture, sculpture and painting.
In the middle of the fifteenth century, the analytical method is put into practice, where treaties writers
develop the means to know and explain reality scientifically and formally. Knowledge and subjects such
as mathematics, optics, perspective, mechanics, anatomy and physiognomy are applied graphically in
their works alongside theoretical studies of light and color.
The artists and treaties writers, who studied Vitruvius, such as Brunelleschi, Alberti, Palladio, Bramante,
Uccello, Piero della Francesca and Leonardo da Vinci, discovered the great systems and techniques of
plane, volumetric and spatial graphic representation; their geometry is drawn mathematics as a comple-
ment to the field of certainty, sharing the criteria of the true sciences. With the studies of Vitruvius, in
architecture antiquity system of geometric proportion is recovered. Knowing the fundaments of geometry
was a central objective of Renaissance Europeans. They found therein a solution to the structural problems
arising out of the representation of visual form. Sight was understood by a numerical language, which
was in turn expressed graphically by means of drawing, which enabled analytical understanding of the
whole and the parts. Thus, too, the new geometric laws of perspective define the language of spatial

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proportion, making it possible to see upon the plane the figures that from a subjective point of view can
be contemplated in real space.
The notion of spatiality determined by perspective, the vanishing point, is the key that enables space
to be consolidated as a system of measurement extending indefinitely away from an observing subject
who defines the objectivity of the world. This serves as a symbolic anticipation for the whole set of social
transformations of the Modern Age. Perspective is the appearance of a pattern of absolute equivalence
implied by an abstract measurement of space according to rational geometric principles. As a tool for
generating space, it constitutes a certain way of drawing and projecting that belongs to the specific
spatial awareness of an epoch.
Modern physics is opposed to medieval understanding, with its Aristotelian origins, which accepted
and imposed the intuitive and sacred distinction between the terrestrial world and the celestial spheres.
Instead it puts forward a totalizing, unifying, homogenizing view. The movements of the stars are ruled
by the same laws and obey the same causes as those guiding the path of a stone thrown by a peasant.
Thus, eminently qualitative Aristotelian physics is opposed by a measurement-based, quantitative physics.
Medieval transcendentalism is replaced by a return to nature as the origin of perfection, without a need
for the divine ideal. Knowledge and mastery of the world is achieved through the empiric way of seeing
and deduction of rational laws. The book of nature is written in mathematical language and geometry
is taken to be the universal law of knowledge upon which any attempt at structural order must be based.

Descriptive Geometry: Precision, Anomie and Infinity

Although Renaissance perspective sets down an abstract system to measure space, it is basically an
ambiguous operation. Each point in a three-dimensional geometric space corresponds to a point in
perspective space, but each point on a perspective drawing can be assigned an infinity of points in three-
dimensional space.
Descriptive geometry, developed by Gaspar Monge around 1800, replaces the subjective, ambiguous
and personalized view with rigid, precise and unequivocal rules of operation that are coherent with the
demands of a new context of strong transformations in the global production system.
It has gone from science as the knowledge of the universe to applied science, that is, from the epoch
of astronomical study to the century of chemistry. The industrial revolution provides designers with an
initial fragmentation between graphic codes and disciplines. While perspective was a productive meeting
between painters and architects, with descriptive geometry, codes are separated into those of artists and
those of technicians (engineers). This first code, descriptive geometry, is applied to production, to the
measurable, to the new demands of mass production systems, while other different procedures would be
applied for expressive, emotive and sensory aspects. Descriptive geometry is both a tool and a metaphor
of the epoch. Its main characteristics are: precision, anomie and infinity, biased by technology, which
replaces the empirical method with a strong universal codification and systemic laws of operation. This
accompanies scientific calculation where all knowledge and action is placed at the service of incipient
industrial development.
The precision of the Monge system is directly connected to the design of machine pieces in assembly
lines of planned production, thus avoiding errors and mistakes in the operations of serial production.
Precision drawing, which implies a different kind of rational thinking, overcomes the ambiguity of per-
spective. There is a perfect graphic correspondence between the points in three-dimensional geometric
space and those on the plane.

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Figure 2. Plan, Module and Proportion: linked geometric relationships that describe an architectural
work as an interlocking system of measures. For centuries the modular concept will remain as the basis
of the rationalization of form.

Anomie is present in the position of the observer in this new space of graphic representation. The
lack of definition of the specific viewpoint places the observer in absolute anonymity. In this way, when
the subject is positioned in the infinite, a certain unity of space (between the current viewpoint and the
object of observation) is fragmented. Unlike perspective, there is no shared place between observer and

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observed. It is only a space of objects and forms; the subject is separate. The control, planning and gen-
eration of these spaces and forms takes place from the outside. This subjective loss of perspective (the
place that identifies the observer) and the loss of the operators’ stamp in factory production (the product
serial number) stands as a metaphoric equivalent to the relationship between the geometric system of
representation used and the industrial production process.
The infiniteness of space erases any intuitive distinction between near and far, reachable and un-
reachable, suggesting absolute homogeneity where everything is possible. In infinite homogenous space
nearness and distance have no personal origin whatsoever.
The buildings made by nineteenth century engineers marked a formal and conceptual rupture with
the traditional architectural building. The ancient system of geometric proportions was mostly aban-
doned, leaving only the concept of modularity as the basis of rationalization of form. A strong practical
understanding of problem solving took its place, where the new geometric modularity was adapted to
the results of graphic calculation, scientific analysis and the demands of other materials and building
systems. Descriptive geometry, with its orthographic projections, provides another mechanism for un-
derstanding and analyzing form and space that still determines a large part of the geometric construction
of architecture and design even today.

Rationalism and Post-Rationalism

New technological experiences (reticular structures with independent facing) played a decisive role in
abandoning traditional wall systems with anchored structural systems to provide formal composition.
Other construction typologies were incorporated, leading to a renewal of form as compositional geometric
systems required by traditional wall systems were abandoned. At the same time, the compositional geo-
metric formulas born of the artistic vanguard at the beginning of the twentieth century were integrated.
New functional principles are established and new building systems created, in accordance with new
technologies and submitting to the rule of the right angle. In classical rationalism, the spatial volumetric
syntax is also organized, like antiquity, through a modular system that orders form. In this case, it begins
with the reticular structure of reinforced concrete and then spreads to all spaces and submits all parts
of the whole to a three-dimensional modular repetition of measurements in the shape of a prismatic
prison that orders its surfaces. This is the height of Cartesian space with its homogenous, unidirectional
continuity in the field of rigorous geometry, creating the concretion of isomorphism with measurable
and unlimited space. The resulting architectural geometry has an arithmetic base and would later evolve
through the possibility of decomposing the building into repeated pieces that could be produced industri-
ally. Modulation is not only a rationalization of form and space into cultural components but, above all,
into technical building possibilities. Rationalism has also defined the typologies of the contemporary
city in strictly geometric terms from a totally Cartesian viewpoint.
The initial rationalist rigor will progressively be replaced as new experiences of possible grid de-
formations or the coexistence of independent geometric systems in the same architectural project lead
the geometry to be resolved less literally and schematically (by accepting its topological relationships
but not its arithmetic). The initial general scheme is conserved, grouping together independent systems
from diverse typologies (Alvar Aalto, Hans Scharoun, Eero Saarinen). In this way, spatial situations and
contextual morphologies are explored more freely once structural symmetries have been abandoned and
the right angle become less essential. The incorporation of more diffuse forms and outlines of continu-
ous surfaces definitively shatters the prismatic container and the serial repetition of structural elements

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Figure 3. Progressive experimentation of possible deformations of a modular plan (accepting their to-
pological relationships but not their arithmetic) or the coexistence of independent geometric systems in
the same architectural project. By breaking the pure prism of the ordering structural grid, the structure
incorporates independent elements and is no longer proposed as a modular serial repetition of parts.
Invention of new structural typologies.

in favor of fluidity and plasticity of space and of each structural piece. By breaking the pure prism of
the ordering structural reticulate, the structure incorporates independent elements and ceases to create
itself as a modular repetition of a series of pieces.

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The experience of double-curved surfaces, prematurely begun by Gaudi, have been incorporated with
technological precision, starting with the development of laminar structures of reinforced concrete (Tor-
roja, Fuller, Candela, Nervi), though the mechanical resistance of materials (Eladio Dieste) or based on
the development of tensioned membranes and suspended space frames (Frei Otto). Thus, a new formal
revolution has been forged out of the geometric control and the execution process of organic spatial
forms, providing firm foundations that would then be taken up again by some contemporary architects.
The formal results with their simply curved (cylindrical or conical) surfaces expand with the develop-
ment of technological typologies that allow other ways of constructing synclastic (spherical) surfaces
and permit systematic constructive development of anticlastic (parabolic and hyperbolic) surfaces. The
criticism of Cartesian thought and its ways of understanding space (Euclidean geometry), the new struc-
tural interventions combined with developments in informatics serve to open up once again the field of
possible geometries to an extent far beyond that experienced with more formal trends.

Contemporary Informalism

Nature can no longer be fully explained with classical geometry. Nature as a constantly changing sys-
tem becomes at every moment the union of infinite elements that interact with each other in complex
ways and non-lineal relationships. The new informatics calculating machines allow designers to draw
much closer to knowledge of the inner mechanisms that are the source of said complexity, simulating
possible rhizomatic interconnections in these chance unforeseen relationships. Using the perspective of
geometry to understand nature, forces designers to rethink it out of more dynamic, interlinked concepts
that are constantly being recreated out of the contextual variables and elements of which it is composed
and through which it is determined.
The new scientific theories of the twentieth century that make up the complexity paradigm (chaos,
catastrophe and fractal theories as well as others relating to the phenomenon of self-organization), point
to the possibility of the impossible by incorporating the existence of the chaotic, unforeseen and irregu-
lar that encompasses all contemporary thought. The change in the conception of science and hence of
mathematics and (fractal, not Euclidean) geometry will affect the language of culture and art, its narra-
tives in cinema and architecture, incorporating new frameworks, new structures that are less rigid, more
interactive and closer to non-linearity and fractioning.
For centuries, designers associated architecture with ideas of stability and a certain modular rigor of
regular grids inscribed into Cartesian space of mainly Euclidean geometry. The new mathematical and
especially geometric procedures propose alternative paths to those of the established design systems
which have historically been based on spatial configuration through perspective-led spatial measure-
ment systems, with the multiview system of parallel projection and the geometric laws of homogenous,
continuous and infinite space.
Contemporary relationships between architecture and its representation speak of the creation of a space
of symbolic and dynamic information where representation often usurps the very identity of its subject.
For example, digital design processes (by using mathematical calculations to graphically anticipate un-
conventional and difficult to grasp geometries at first sight) and immediate construction possibilities (by
challenging analogue production systems in realizing and materializing many of the virtually-generated
ideas). In this way, the current state of contemporary architecture in our times displays a mixed, hybrid
and/or symbiotic interplay of post-mechanical, industrial and pre-industrial technologies.

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Figure 4. New formal revolution from the geometric control and the process of execution of spatial or-
ganic forms. The new digital mathematical calculation procedures, through graphic computer science,
are modifying the architectural spatiality distancing itself from the stability and modular rigor of the
Cartesian space.

Creativity and Computational Making

Contemporary, strategic, open, rhizomatic thinking processes put forward non-linear complexity as an
alternative to more traditional project design methods. Many answers can be found in these processes
that were before only sought in one-directional final resolutions. The origins, processes and final results
are not stable, simple and pure but instead complex and elusive. In many project design experiences in
recent decades (Eisenman; Herzog & De Meuron; Zaera Polo; Nox; Miralles), the objects have been
conceived in the process itself, which have begun with approaches whose results are more characteristic
of the process itself than of the adoption of compositional or functional-rational categories.
It is possible to shift the gaze towards the field of abstract architectural knowledge, which it is both
extensive and complex and fundamentally covers the understanding of space and form – or to put it in
a more integral way – of forms in space. This abstract understanding is made up of: geometry, spatial
mathematics and theories studying the knowledge, understanding and creation of form. Space and form
define this abstract architectural knowledge and are the lens through which buildings and built space
are visualised.

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The main creative problem the architecture student faces is to transcend the logical understanding
and representation of real space, imagining and representing that which does not yet exist. Complex
processes are needed to overcome mere imitation of the known, ranging from the infinite possibilities
of variation and development to the invention or innovation of everyday phenomena.
Both variation and development come across as cultural operations that serve as an approach to the
production of ideas and forms in space. Thus, mere imitation is overcome and the spectrum of what is
known is enriched. Development is less intuitive than variation, demanding certain processes of analysis
and reformulation of the known.
The final category is innovation, which involves the creation of new solutions radically different from
any given conventional situation. Unlike repetition, variation and development, innovation is a typically
modern phenomenon. It is strongly linked to the idea of progress and rupture with the known and, in
modern tradition, summons up an image of creative freedom that is more individual than collective
in nature. In contemporary times, the myth of the talented genius and solitary creator is viewed with
a degree of skepticism. By the logic of the new digital media, the interactive creation and innovation
process implies working in groups, with different menus for a number of software, shared databases of
digital objects (created by other anonymous persons), archive libraries and, primarily, website archives.
Encouraging innovation above and beyond the other categories that transform reality has been, ever
since the Bauhaus paradigm, widely supported as one of the main purposes of architecture teaching.
Project design competitions and specialist magazines endorse innovation as an aspect of creativity, but
(unlike variation and development) it is not easy to find a clear direction through it for the learning pro-
cess. Some specific working conditions are necessary and the individuals with innovative skills must
have both a good repertoire of knowledge and strategic use of certain technical tools for project design.
Viable development, that is, the formulation of a problem through to its resolution, happens through
intuition, imagination, reasoning and all the possible combinations within this “black box” that is the
laboratory of creativity.
It is possible to define the creative act as the incessant search for something as yet unknown to
designer, something like an attempt to imprint this unknown content upon our own mind, an imprint a
given human being is not aware of having received until he is suddenly faced with the very image he
is searching for with his conscious mind. To quote Donald Schön (1983): “the (architecture or) design
student knows that he needs to look for something but he does not know what it is”. It is only at this
moment of discovery that it becomes possible to build it. The act of designing is seen to be an attempt
to elevate the unknown content to a place where it can be identified and conceptualized as tangible
content, presentable in cognitive terms; that is, as a progressive description of an object that does not
exist at the beginning of the description. In this way, the design process can be conceived as a series of
transformations from an initial state with a low level of information and a high degree of uncertainty to
a final state with a great deal of information and little uncertainty. It is well known that between object
design and its image exists a complex mechanism of perception, thinking and knowing that is difficult
to grasp in simple, logical, linear and predictable processes.
The success of a creative learning process cannot only be reflected in the capacity to understand the
complexity of the architectural phenomenon in all its dimensions in order to respond adequately and
flexibly to concrete situations. It also demands the discovery of new conceptual and operational tools
to broaden the very possibilities of project design thinking.

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Figure 5. Contemporary, strategic, open, rhizomatic processes of ideation pose a non-linear complexity
as an alternative to the traditional methods of the project.

Currently, designer creativity has expanded significantly through the processes of exchange and
interaction brought about by collective authorship (De Kerckhove, 1999), digital databases (Manovich,
2001) and hypertext construction of information and communication technologies (Piscitelli, 2005).
Regarding architecture’s multiple conceptual and operative tools, it is desirable reflecting upon the logic
and proceedings not commonly used in traditional teaching that derive from strategic incorporation of
Computational Making into creative processes. Thus, it is advisable to propose broadening the devel-
opment fostered by traditional teaching with concepts from Computational Making such as: numerical
representation, modularity, automation, variability and transcoding (Manovich; 2001). The main objec-
tive is to unfold new capacities through teaching-learning processes supported by Active Learning and
Computational Methods for Architecture
The parametric design proposes the generation of geometry from the definition of a family of
initial parameters and the programming of formal relations between them. These design processes
create dynamic and variable design possibilities. They do not produce a single solution, but a family
of possible solutions.

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Dynamic Generative Systems

The world is understood and visually represented thanks to geometry. Mathematics, art and design
have historically been used to represent, attempt to know and reinvent the world, generating new forms
through logical principles suggested by this science of form and space. Geometry allows designers not
just to access reality but also to participate in it and reinvent it. It stands between perception and the
corresponding concepts that arise. It is possible also to see geometry as a key strategic tool for ordering
reality: the reality of a world that escapes our gaze. It gives designers a way to see and know forms and
space, providing concepts that enable designers to understand a complicated visual reality through the
ability to translate any image into thought and any thought into image. The development of Western
thought on the creation of form and space through history, has been conditioned and strengthened by
this initial way of seeing and formulating the world that geometry provides.
Parametric design introduces geometry from a mathematical-algorithmic viewpoint. It proposes the
generation of geometry by defining an initial family of parameters and programming formal relationships
between them. In these design processes, algorithms and advanced computer resources are not simply
used to represent forms but rather to create dynamic and variable design possibilities. No single unique
solution is produced, but rather a family of possible solutions. Variables and algorithms are used to build
a tree of mathematical and geometric relationships, calculating the range of possible solutions permitted
by an initial selection of parameters and components. Interest in strategic incorporation of parametric
design into the design process arises from the possibility of using new tools and resources to broaden
the scope of response in design work.
Over the last decade, international architecture has incorporated parameterization into project work
as a new, dynamic and variable strategy in the design process itself, generating innovative structural,
formal, spatial and technological solutions. Any early incorporation of parametric design would demand
a review of current design processes to include concepts and dynamic variables from relational data.
Parametric design is an algorithmic mathematical technique that enables the user to alter determined
characteristics of the model at any point in the process without having to recalculate other characteristics
that would be affected by such changes. It thus becomes a powerful tool for developing a codified (modi-
fiable and adaptable) system able to automatically detect and assess in real time a family of alternatives
to the proposed problem according to pre-established parameters. Its use demands a change in mentality.
Mathematical algorithms can be used to facilitate analysis, extract specificities, find relationships and
identify laws, if and when they are used in open platforms that allow them to be personalized by the user.
Moreover, they adjust space and objects into a new way of seeing the world that does not seek only
to obtain complex forms, but also focuses on efficiency and adaptability. In order to change representa-
tion tools to dynamic simulation systems, the architectural community must be prepared to think up
new design strategies and incorporate collective building processes with more open ways of thinking
about design solutions. Dynamic generative systems are less a complex tool for representation than a
vehicle for thought that can be modified and interrelated over time. Their principles are closer to dy-
namic performance, contextual adaptability and interface and open processes than to the definition of
simple finished objects.

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Figure 6. Dynamic Generator Systems make it possible to generate and save flexible processes that can
be modified indefinitely by other users to explore other possibilities. The process is a pattern, and these
patterns in codes are information mechanisms and knowledge of solutions to design problems.

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Simple Parametric Strategies and Complex Spaces

Contemporary architecture has discovered connections with concepts arising out of complexity science.
Thus, over the last two decades, concepts that have come across from science have found representation
in architectural forms, generating extraordinary and high-profile works of architecture that make use of
both the communicative and symbolic potential of architecture and the capacities for spatial and formal
manipulation offered by the new technologies. Such technologies have immediate impact on the com-
plex design and development processes, while innovations in building materials are slower to catch on.

Peter Eisenman largely draws inspiration from morphogenetic theory in biological sciences; Bernard
Tschumi uses procedures from literary and cinematographic theory; Greg Lynn utilizes processes from
fractal theory in mathematics emphasizing the development of organic forms; Van Berkel shows an
affinity towards dynamic influences from all fields of knowledge, which he implements in his own in-
terpretations of the urban vectors of his projects, such as traffic and circulation; in Sejima, the virtual
limits of the information society are constantly being explored; and FOA finds, in the genetic concept
of phylogenesis, the basis to implement new classifications of architectural identity and consistency.
(Martinez-Puebla Pons, 2007)

Scientific complexity in architecture has been reflected, in most cases, in the complex geometries
and formal syntaxes made possible by the strategic incorporation of digital media in non-linear, random
and open design processes as a first counterpoint to the Cartesian thinking so common up to the present
day. In this way, spatial situations and contextual morphologies with considerable freedom of form are
explored through abandoning structural symmetries and reducing reliance on right angles. The incorpo-
ration of more diffuse continuous surfaces and forms indicates a clear break from the modern prismatic
container and serial repetition of structural elements in favor of fluidity and plasticity of space and of
each structural part. On breaking apart the pure prism and moving away from the ordering structural
grid, the structure incorporates independent elements and ceases to express itself as a serial modular
repetition of parts.
Criticism of Cartesian thinking and it ways of understanding space (Euclidean geometry) and the new
structural inventions, combined with development in informatics open the field of possible geometries
far wider than the formalistic trends of the past. For centuries, architecture has been associated with
ideas of stability and modular rigour with regulating grids inscribed upon a Cartesian space of primarily
Euclidean geometry. The new mathematical and, especially, geometric procedures offer alternative paths
to the established design systems, based historically on spatial configuration arising from perspective-led
spatial metrics, multiview parallel projection systems and the geometric logic of homogenous, continu-
ous and infinite space.
Digital tools open the way for new complexities of form deriving more from indeterminacy and
randomness than from simple patterns with clear mathematical laws of generation. The formal complex-
ity based on the topological definition of curvilinear or broken surfaces stands in sharp contrast to the
geometric definition of the orthographic grid or the repetition of uniform porticos. Concepts like genetic
architecture, botanical-digital architecture, bio-mimetic architecture, liquid architecture, trans-architecture
and so on, move away from classical, planimetric, orthographic definitions to work with folding modern
space, where floors, walls and roofs curve in a single continuous surface.

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Complex geometric systems and considerable experimentation in form seeks to integrate spatial
exploration with new technological concepts. Form reaches towards polarities, either towards a deep
sense of identification with the formless or premorphic, or towards structural absolutism in its unlimited
consistency of purity. In geometric syntax, the right angle no longer dominates. Structural typologies
acquire newfound significance in a design that seeks expressiveness through strong oblique directions and
curved guidelines for the building envelope. Traditional compositions are left behind with the continuous
solutions for walls, floors and roofs, which are no longer distinguishable in quality and materiality. Im-
ages associated with non-Euclidean geometry would seem to mark a path for grasping and approaching
complexity, thus broadening understanding of processes of morphogenesis and the systemic culture of the
designer. In this way, understanding the new geometries and the tools that control them enables designers
to observe reality in a new way and hence broaden the resources available for the architectural project.
These new works of architecture face the challenge of accompanying the design complexity gener-
ated by the informatics tools with progress in the knowledge of other building forms (or reformulation
of known systems) to avoid the risk that the complexity is limited to the resulting geometry and not the
construction processes themselves.
Simple parametric strategies allow the development of coded systems (Modifiable and adaptable),
capable of automatically detecting and evaluating, in real time and simultaneously with the design act, a
family of alternatives to the problem posed. According to pre-established parameters (such as construc-
tion systems, terrain suitability, orientation) allows the rationalized generation of complex spaces and
shapes that respond to a better performance and efficiency in the design.

Digital Materiality

The efficiency of graphic digital systems is multiplied by implementing software that allows the use of
programmable parameters and components through an order sequence. Considerable progress is made in
geometric research by incorporating another language for communication – visual programming – into
the traditional graphic reasoning associated with descriptive geometry. But perhaps the most interesting
point is that this tool provides the necessary bridge to connect mathematical knowledge (graphic and
analytical geometry) with programming to create a software and/or project using the personalized design
of a process or set of actions. According to Pottmann (Pottmann, 2007), this involves filling the existing
void between technical possibility and effective knowledge for the new methods of geometric design.
Incorporating visual programming at the project design stage not only offers the possibility of develop-
ing multiple design alternatives (by logical formalization of the process, its conditions and geometric
relationships), but also enables the integration of multiple analysis variables, increasing the efficiency
of the project and its materials. Parametric design and digital manufacturing are mutually beneficial,
integrating complementary techniques and procedures and simplifying and automating construction of
the resulting complex geometries.
The concept of digital materiality arises out of these interactions. This concept, first identified by
Gramazio & Kohler, lies within the complex interweaving between computer programming, multimedia
building or manufacture and the data and the materials, at the different stages of the architectural proj-
ect and its materialization. It provides a reflective provocation born of a certain inertia from traditional
architectural culture, both in terms of its expression and its production capacity, establishing new links
that widen and enrich the relationship between design, technology and the built environment.

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Figure 7. Digital Process Workshops (Dalla Costa, Chiarella, Tosello, Veizaga, Gronda).

Visual programming software is gaining popularity in all fields of design both in research and in
practice to ensure geometric control of unconventional building processes. Process automation with
the possibility for personalization and individualization of variable components offers the possibility
of widespread use at a similar cost to the industrial standardization of our more familiar prefabrication

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Figure 8. BANCAPAR (Winner of Fondart Regional-Chile and CLAP Platinum 2014-2015), is a bank
designed parametrically and conceived as object of Public Art. Initiated from self-management and
shared authorship (Chile-Argentina) for the Faculty of Industrial Engineering (UBioBio, Chile). The
interdisciplinary work between teams from two Latin American countries transforms it into an unprec-
edented project of collaborative design in the region (https://vimeo.com/112542929). Credits: Nicolás
Saez, Mauro Chiarella, Matías Dalla Costa, Martín Veizaga, Luciana Gronda, Luis García, Rodrigo
García Alvarado.

models. Although this statement is not yet verifiable in every case, its future potential can be clearly
seen and current research progresses optimistically towards this goal. Operating with such logic involves
broadening technical building capacities, concentrating efforts not just on conceiving and controlling
complex geometries, but on advancing towards a coherent way of building with rational criteria. In
order to achieve widespread experience of automation in building and design processes, research must
be encouraged that works on the geometric-constructive connections between assembly systems arising
from an exploration of form for CAD/CAM processes and the inherited industrial technology systems.

CONCLUSION

In the field of design, the functional/rationalist discourse of an ideology seeking to satisfy natural hu-
man needs has lost ground in favor of more dispersed stories that understand architecture through its
cultural meaning and significance. Many theorists have seen these trends in contemporary thought as
a return to subjectivist thinking and a distancing from blind faith in objectivism and from the general-

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izing and totalizing pretensions of science and modern philosophy. Thus, architecture is thought from
the limits of its own thinking (to allow epistemological cross-currents) out of a recognition of language
and communication as central elements of culture, where all reality can be read as an open book seeking
cross-discipline, rhizomatic thinking with which to understand the cultural production of space. In this
way, in recent decades, spatial organization in architecture has become increasingly complex so that it
can no longer be described or designed with the representation systems inherited from the industrial
revolution (parallel projections, Monge system) or from the Renaissance sense of perspective. Classical
orthographic projections limit the formal possibilities arising from a more complex compression of space,
which can no longer be summarized in simple transversal and longitudinal descriptions of the form using
elevations, plans and sections. It is here that digital media appear, broadening horizons through repre-
sentation, simulation, computer design and digital manufacturing. If the paradigm of digital complexity
is to be accepted by contemporary project design, then sufficient criteria about what is known and the
fundaments of all the possible options is needed to accompany any research and/or exploration with as
many feasible formal and technical resources as possible to serve the project objectives and process. In
conclusion, this means that initial training and professional development cannot be centered solely on
learning and directly applying the necessary knowledge and skills to handle digital design tools, but on
understanding what such representation and pre-figuration tools signify for architectural understanding
and design. Put another way, the available technological resources must be accompanied by an integrat-
ing and strategic way of seeing to achieve a wide-scoped capacity for building complex systems that
intervene in the act of architectural design

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