Mediterranean academy of architecture

* Company:

Mediterranean academy of architecture

* I'm also a:

Owner/principal

City:

Cava de' Tirreni (SA) - ITALY

Description:

centro di formazione e ricerca

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/medfablab.cava

Website:

http://www.medaarch.com/

08JUL 2013

COCOON / a temporary pavilion / Medaarch / Co-de.iT

Posted in Design - Installations by Mediterranean academy of architecture

Cocoon is a pavilion made out of corrugated cardboard, result of GH_to Fabrication workshop held at the Mediterranean FabLab of Cava De’ Tirreni from 13 to 16 May 2013 in collaboration with Co-de.iT.

The course is in addition to many educational activities held by Medaarch with the intention to investigate the processes that lead from design architectural artifacts, until their physical realization. In this way participants had the opportunity to learn the design approaches and procedures for defining the pavilion, designed as a ring with size of 7.

17×5.13×3.

10 meters. Tutors Andrea Graziano and Amleto Picerno, step by step, introduced the participants to the concepts of computational design and digital fabrication through an introduction to using Rhino, Grashopper and Kangaroo.

Finally, the whole staff was involved in the assembly of the panels of cardboard cut from the CRTS Paper and assembled in the Mediateca Marte of Cava de’ Tirreni (Sa). Design _ To define the size of the pavilion we took into account a defined space, usually used as a reading room or occupied by events, musical performances and workshops for children.

Cocoon has been designed as a continuation of the opposite bookshop and formalized as an organism that wants to prevail on the room that receives it, and want to show through the glass walls that surround it.The participants to the workshop, once defined the area in Rhinoceros, have learned how to divide in hexagons in a complex surface and planarize the panels obtained, in order to make them printable, in straight line, by a cutter. Once optimized planar components of the surface, has been studied the generation of the pattern to be applied to the ring, with the intent to lighten the structure and create a permeability between interior and exterior space.

The final result was generated by operating with codes capable of repeating sequences of information that leave emerge, from time to time, different and (in potential) infinite patterns. In this way, we have identified the hexagons to be drilled and evaluated the result from the point of view of the functional, structural and formal aspects.

The use of the software Grasshopper has allowed the design the assembly system, optimized for all different panels that constitute the pavilion. The system provides the fins, for each side of the hexagon, of a width of 10 cm, which, appropriately perforated, allowing the coupling between adjacent pieces by the use of plastic cable ties.

The fins are then bent at 90 degrees around the perimeter of the panel, thanks to the cut at 45 ° made by the cutter which has allowed an optimal bending of the material. Also, the pieces have been numbered, both in the virtual model, both in the phase of nesting, in order to have in print an identification number for each panel.

This system allows the detection, fast and useful, of each hexagon in the assembly phase.Prototyping _ A part of the structure has been tested with a first cut and assembled using a very simple method: with the use of 4 clamps and 4 metal rings, which prevent the first ones to tear the sheet of cardboard, you can hold together a pair of hexagons.

So, everything you need to mount the entire pavilion is in a box that contains 1500 ties and 1500 rings!Interesting for the participants of the workshop was also the initial implementation of a prototype of the pavilion itself, on a smaller scale through the 3dprinter. Production _ The type of cardboard chosen for the realization was that with triple wave, and of the thickness of 14 mm, color Havana. The sheets available for cutting have dimensions of 1590 x 1190mm and on these was made the nesting of all pieces optimizing their positioning in order to reduce the waste of printing.

So, we arrived, to the leveling of 83 sheets capable of holding 231 pieces. The machine used for printing was a cutter floor 200 x 200cm with jagged tip and manual tool change, able to perform creasing and cuts at 45 °.

This printer took 4 hours and 20 minutes to make all the cuts.Assembly _ Once printed all the pieces and transported to the appropriate location for the installation, the team has formed two teams to divide the panels in dozens, eliminate the gap of the cut, and draw down the space that would be occupied by the pavilion.

Then we moved to the assembly phase, through a system to occurrences which composed the different pieces subsequent along the perimeter. During the assembly phase were needed some anchors of the structure to secure elements, present on site, in order to support the weight of the same construction until the complete positioning of all the hexagons.

The assembly lasted 2 days, during which the two teams, each consisting of 5 members, worked 10 hours.Finally, the result obtained has been chosen as a space for musical performances, played by guitarist Carmine Picariello and violinist Giovanna Trapanese demonstrating the excellent sound characteristics of the structure that is able, thanks to its shape and its material, to condense a sound clean and soft.

City:
Cava De’ Tirreni

Status:
Completed

Website:
http://www.medaarch.com/mediterraneanfablab/

Website (references):
http://www.co-de-it.com/

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