Course of the case study
When the case study was initiated, the plan was to mainly focus on the Case project. The start date was based on the course of the project, but due to project delays, client meet-ings and lack of resources, introduction to the project was not given until week two. The first week was therefore spent on another project, Project, which continued throughout the case study (see appendix E).
For the first three weeks, a passive approach to the design team and project in general was applied. Contributions to the project would only be given, when asked directly. This was due taking passive observations on how the team worked, without interference from
‘newcomers’. Also, it was interesting to see what kind of tasks they would request from two engineering students, i.e. what do they expect when having early collaboration with in-house engineers on the design team. The competencies of the thesis authors were elaborated to the head of sustainability, the contact person, and to the lead architect on the Case project before the case study was initiated. Everyone else in the office had received an information email, regarding two architectural engineering students doing an internship at the office, and it was announced that everyone could ask for engineering assistance, if wanted.
For the following six weeks, a more participating role was undertaken. Observations would still be noted, but it would be on how the architects coped with information, which they would not normally receive in this stage of the project, and which they did not ask for themselves i.e. information they did not know they needed. Instead of waiting
WEEK 1
PASSIVE
WEEK 2 WEEK 4 WEEK 6
ACTIVE
WEEK 8
WEEK 3 WEEK 5 WEEK 7 WEEK 9
Project Daylight analysis
Case Shadow studies
Case Parametric facade
Case & Project Parametric facade
Daylight analysis Energy calculation
Case Parametric facade
Daylight analysis Energy calculation
Case Parametric facade Energy calculation
Case Portfolio
Case Portfolio Case
Introduction
Figure 16 - Course of the case study and the technical scientific information infused in the design process by the authors.
for the architects to directly ask for contributions, contributions were made in regards of daylight analysis, energy simulations and façade design and then presented. When an opportunity for contributions were seen, actions were made.
A daily log was kept during time of the case study, which has been used to keep track of both actions, actors, deadlines and observations. The log can be found (in Danish) in Appendix E.
Case project facts
The specific case was a new large multipurpose building in the centre of Case. The build-ing features a shoppbuild-ing centre for retail, a hotel, restaurant and sky bar, cinema, fitness/
wellness, and housing. The building was approximately 100,000 m2 with a ‘base’ of 13 floors and a hotel/residential tower of 17 floors, adding up to a total height of 98.5 m above terrain.
Figure 17 - The Case project in Case as presented in the latest portfolio
Figure 18 - The Case project in Case as presented in the latest portfolio
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The case project had very high ambitions within all aspects of sustainability and aims for best practise and to become a model example in ‘mixed-use’ buildings of high density.
External innovation funding was obtained to explore and exploit advanced energy de-sign strategies in the mixed-use building project. The project strived to comply with the
‘BREEAM NOR Excellent’ sustainability certification as a minimum.
The project has been underway since 2015, when Studio A Architects won the design competition. Due to the size of the building lot, the building has a local planning act of its own, and since design proposal is not feasible in current plan for development in the area of Case city centre, the plans are to be processed for approval by the agency of the Case municipality. Once the project is approved, a Design – Build contract is pending, however, the project is currently developing at a schematic level with architects and landscaping as the only disciplines involved so far. The Norwegian process for approval of new development plans is different from the Danish, mainly in the sense, that it is very lengthy. Hence, the design process of the project also differs from that of a ‘normal’
project.
The owner and lead architect has had an ongoing dialogue about the design, since the design competition was won. The work committed during the case study was working towards a final hand-in for the Case municipality, as the current design requires changes in the local plan.
Due to the long process of the project, the design team has changed since the compe-tition in 2015. Multiple people have been involved in the project on and off, and only one person has been a consistent part of the design team throughout the entire process.
Until recently, two people have been working full time on the project, however due to practicalities several people are currently allocated part time to the project team. During the case study, the design team has consisted of a lead architect/project manager, four additional architects, of whom one is head of sustainability, and one landscape architect have been allocated part time.
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Fasade Lybekkergata @1:500
G U N E R I U S K V A R T A L E T I L L U S T R A S J O N S P R O S J E K T / M a i 2 0 1 7
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08.05.2015 Contest proposal Portfolio
> 100.000 m2 (assumed incl. basement)
> 13-20 floors (without/with tower)
> 42-67 m (without/with tower)
> Rounded corners
> Straight facade
12.10.2016
Planproposal - sketch Client presentation
> 80.595 m2 (above terrain)
> 21 floors
> 78 m
> Sharp corners
> Straight facade
31.05.2017
Planproposal - final hand-in Portfolio
> Assuming 92.000 m2 (above terrain)
> 30 floors
> 102,5 m
> Sharp corners
> Parametric facade 04.04.2017
Planproposal - concept and facade Client presentation
> 92.000 m2 (above terrain)
> 30 floors
> 100 m
> Sharp corners
> Parametric facade
Start of case study
Figure 19 - Overview of the development of the Case project
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Observations
The following section outlines general observations made in the architectural studio during the case study concerning the culture in the office, which relates to the way project work is done and hence to the design process and design culture of the studio in general. Fur-thermore, observations on specific case study project related themes are presented. These provide a more detailed insight to the specific design process and approach to design in the case study project.
Social culture and professional mind-set
Observations of the social culture in a workplace can tell something about the working environment and general attitude towards the work place in terms of motivation and job satisfaction. The social culture and social interactions among employees in general can tell something about the general working culture. If there is a good work culture and employees feel satisfied and safe in their jobs, the first levels in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs are fulfilled, hence a need for social interaction with others become prevailing.
The atmosphere in the office was very social. There was joint breakfast every day at 9.30, cake on Thursday afternoons, and social events after office hours every Friday. Competi-tion wins and new projects were celebrated with a bell ring and a glass of bubbles for everyone. Lunch was not organised by the company; however, everyone came together in the communal kitchen to sit down and have lunch together.
The working environment was characterised by a high level of focus. There was very little small talk in the office, except for in the communal kitchen, where employees came together for breaks and to get coffee. Most employees had headphones on when sitting at their desks working, and work related conversations were usually held in meeting rooms to not disturb colleagues. The focused attitude towards the work tasks show that the employees take their work very seriously and are passionate and motivated to do a good job and design great projects. From this, it must be assumed that the attitude towards having two engineering students on board a project will be positive, as it could bring value and contribute to the overall quality of the work.
Natural curiosity
In the first week of the case study, many architects approached the thesis authors out of interest in how the engineers could contribute to their projects. Some architects had clear ideas of how their projects could benefit by engineering inputs; Other architects
saw a possibility to be taught by engineers how to use specific programs and hence improve their skills; Others were interested in hearing how the authors would be able contribute to a specific project.
The authors’ way in to the project
The case study was arranged by the thesis supervisor, Lotte Bjerregaard Jensen, through her contact person at Studio A, the Head of Research and Sustainability. After a few meet-ings and emailing back and forth, an appropriate project was picked for the case study.
The lead architect/project manager of the specific project was not part of the conversa-tions regarding the aim and scope of the case study.
It seemed that the employees in general and the lead architect on the Case project was not entirely sure how to utilise the work force provided by having two architectural engineering students. In general, there was some hesitation about wanting inputs even though interest was shown. This might be because the lead architect was not entirely sure what the scope of the collaboration of this case study was, since he had merely agreed to expand the team with two architectural engineers and not been part of the preliminary meetings about the case study. Hence, he might not have been fully aware how and what architectural engineers were capable of contributing to the project. Since each profession is experts within each their fields, it is their responsibility to communi-cate what and how they can contribute to the design. Hence, the authors showed how they were able to contribute to the integration of technical knowledge in the design de-velopment, through active participating in the project in case study week 3-9 (see page 116-127 for elaboration on contributions)
Project management
The first impressions were that the project team was quite unorganised and that no one really knew details of the design development plan, what other team members were working on and why. A critical reason for this might have been that most design meet-ings were held 1:1 and the entire team rarely was gathered. The lead architect distribut-ed the tasks and held individual meetings with the assigndistribut-ed person about the work and design development in the specific area. It was thus only the lead architect who had the full overview of design decisions and development. The project team and management was thus very fragmented. The lack of overview and insight for individual team members repeatedly caused issues with e.g. inconsistency in file management, overlapping work of multiple team members due to lack of coordination, misunderstandings about deadlines, etc.
Good intentions
In June 2016, a large engineering consultancy made a report of wind analysis of three variations of the building design. From the report, the challenges concerning wind condi-tions and outdoor comfort of pedestrians, as well as different effects the building design, were outlined. The building design had developed since the report was made, however, it was not clear whether the results of the report had been contemplated in the design development. Further wind analysis of the updated design had not been made. From the semi-structured interview with the lead architect it was made clear, that this was due to client hesitation about spending the money on a new analysis.
A document addressing sustainability in the project was drafted in December 2016. The document contained measureable goals for different aspects of the building design. It also presented ideas of collaboration schemes and which actors to invite to participate in specific phases, among other. However, the document had no immediate application in the project so far.
External innovation funding was obtained to explore and exploit advanced energy de-sign strategies in the mixed-use building project. The building dede-sign and function lay-out was still developing, and will continue to do so throughlay-out the approval process of the Case municipality, which is expected complete in the summer of 2019. Because the design was not yet settled, the client and/or project team were hesitant about commenc-ing the work with the energy design. It was thought to be on a level of detail to where the project was not yet advanced. Thus, the energy strategy and design would not influ-ence the schematic design and e.g. overall geometry of the building design. A potential for exploiting passive energy strategies was not harnessed to the fullest.
A Design – Build contract was pending, however the contractor and sub-consultants would not be appointed until the project plans were approved. Aspects such as construc-tion cost, buildability, and principles for structural concepts and technical installaconstruc-tions were not necessarily considered sufficiently in the schematic design, since the expert knowledge of the respective trades had not been present in the design process.
Examples of inputs and communications
On the following pages, four examples on observations during active participation, is described in depth. The examples are the result of the main inputs given by the authors to the design team, and concerns shadow studies, parametric façade layout, daylight analysis and energy performance calculations.
The examples presented in the following represent the majority of the work done by the authors of this thesis during the case study and were hence the main inputs to the design team. Each of the examples represent days or weeks of work, through many itera-tions. Not all the examples are on purely technical aspects, which makes it interesting as the line between the engineering and architectural profession is crossed.
On the following pages, the four examples are described by first addressing the inputs with a ‘why’, ‘how’ and ‘what’ followed by the outcome with a ‘response’, ‘implementation’
and “perspective”. Images of the inputs can be seen under the ‘what’ category. The ex-amples will be used to make the observational findings more tangible, and as reasoning for the perspectives drawn. Also, it will show the technical engineering tasks performed by the authors.
The studies and simulations were conducted in Grasshopper, utilising the components from the Honeybee and Ladybug plug-in. As described in ‘Integrated Energy Design’ on page 88, Grasshopper links to Rhinoceros, which meant that the architectural model – for a large part – could be used as base geometry in the analysis.
Ladybug is described by its creators as “an open source environmental plugin for Grasshopper3D that helps architects and engineers create an environmentally-conscious architectural design. La-dybug imports standard EnergyPlus Weather files (.EPW) into Grasshopper and provides a variety of 3D interactive graphics to support the decision-making process during the initial stages of design”
(Roudsari, 2016).
Ladybug can import weather data from several locations worldwide; in the examples shown on the following pages, an EnergyPlus weather file for Case is used. The environmental plugin can therefore show both temperatures, wind rose, solar path as well as multiple other environmen-tal data for the specific location. The plugin is used for the shadow studies as well as studies on radiation and sunlight-hour analysis. However, only the shadow studies are included in the shown material in this thesis. The ladybug weather import component is fundamental for the honeybee plugin to function.
Honeybee is described in the Honeybee-primer as a program that “connects Grasshopper3D to EnergyPlus, Radiance, Daysim and OpenStudio for building energy and daylighting simulation. The Honeybee project intends to make many of the features of these simulation tools available in a parametric way. You need to have Ladybug installed in order to run Honeybee” (Farke et al., 2014).
Honeybee is in the following examples used for simulation of daylight levels and energy per-formance.
For the parametric façade example, the built-in components for Grasshopper are used, as well as some Panelling tools.
The lead architect gave an example of previous shadow diagrams to create an idea of the outcome, and ex-pected similar. It was tried to challenge their usual way of doing shadow studies by asking if they could use more quantitative analysis, where e.g. the sun hours on street level was measured instead of purely having a static top-view picture of the building and surroundings. However, it was not required for the current state of the project, and time was better spent elsewhere.
In connection with the client presentation in the beginning of the case study, shadow studies on the building and surroundings had to be made. It was not clear whether these studies were to be used for analysis and design development or were thought as a retrospective examination of the design.
WHY HO W WHA T IMPL EMEN TA TION PERSPECTIV E
RESPONSEDifferent possibilities for conducting the shadow studies was explored. As updates to the Rhino model were continuously ongoing right up to the deadline for the presentation, the shadow studies would have to be made quickly, once the model was ready.
A Grasshopper script was set up to run on the Rhino model once this was ready. However, the Rhino model was very heavy, which caused some difficulties in connection to available computer power. Test analysis were made with the embedded Rhino render tool for sun options. The possibilities of the tool were explored while waiting for the finalised Rhino model. Once it was ready, approximately 15 minutes was spent running the analysis.
There was no response to the shadow diagrams when communicated to the lead architect.
Joint design meetings or sessions were not held, so the shadow diagrams were set up in a quick layout and sent it to the lead architect in an email. From the final presentation material, it was evident that the shad-ow studies were not used for analysis and design development, yet they were included in the presentation material in the same layout as used to present to lead architect. Even if not used to develop the design, the diagrams were still value-adding in a validating way.
There was a great unused potential for adding value to the design process, by actively using the shadow studies, but they were not exploited.
FORSLAG E SOLSTUDIER - JUNI
21. juni kl 15:00 21. juni kl 18:00
21. juni kl 09:00 21. juni kl 12:00
SKYGGEDIAGRAMMER - MARTS
21. marts kl 09:00 21. marts kl 12:00
21. marts kl 15:00 21. marts kl 18:00
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The process might be more important than the result when designing, especially when having different dis-ciplines working together. By gaining insight in each other’s work, potentials could be found.
The hotel façade was made up of panels, where the outer glass was angled compared to the façade. The same panel could be turned either way and thus make up two different types – A and B. The layout of the façade panels should have a randomised expression in the pattern made up of panels.
WHY HO W WHA T IMPL EMEN TA TION PERSPECTIV E RESPONSE
A script for randomisation of the panels was set up in Grasshopper. A random function was connected with a seed and ratio of A and B panels. Hence the level of randomisation, i.e. the distribution in the layout pattern could be controlled along with the number of A panels compared to B panels.
In the first instance, the lead architect felt there were too many larger clusters of the same panel, either AA or B, in the façade layout. The fully randomised structure was too uncontrolled. What he wanted was a sort of structured non-structure, where the layout seems accidental, but at the same time structured enough to not have great fluctuations in the pattern of the A and B types.
Once the script had been altered to accommodate the wish for control of the layout pattern, the lead architect was run through the process of working with the script. He was thus able to make alterations to the seed and ratio and thus be able to see the expression of the façade change, until he found the desired balance. The lead architect said he was “really impressed”.
The mathematical expression had to be changed several times after dialogues with lead architect. The facade design is a major design decision, where the parametrically structure is great for rapid changes and feedback.
In the final design of the façade layout, the script was not applied. This was due to the difference in expres-sion of the model and the rendered images of the façade. However, the process of working with the design in collaboration was good in the sense that it gave insight to the involved parties. The architect actually seemed surprised to see the potential of the tool. This was a break through.
This example shows two different kinds of design process; the first, where the technical input functions as an assistant to the architect. It is more difficult to express exactly what you want from a design that to look at a design proposal, and determine, that it is not what you want. It is easier to work from a suggestion than a blank canvas. However, from the example above, it is obvious that a design collaboration, where you gain insight to the tricky parts of the work of the disciplines you have to work with, a higher level of ownership for the design from all involved disciplines is obtained.