HIGH-LOW : AA São Paulo Design Workshop

The aim of this programme is to rehabilitate marginalised environments, populations and materials through the use of innovative computational ecological design and digital fabrication processes. With these tactics we will define a new generation of digital design that employs both high-tech and low-tech strategies. Parametric design generation and digital fabrication techniques will be used to computationally redesign low-tech building strategies, mixing high-tech expertise with local labor knowledge. Taking place in the Escola São Paulo, a cultural centre for art, fashion and design, the objective of the workshop is to transform conventional sustainable design strategies so as to bring ecological design a new aesthetic and social agenda.

Thus, this high-tech/low tech strategy will focus on environmental mediation, using high-tech environmental computational simulation software and environmental parametric design to design low-tech environmental mediation systems. The workshop will employ agent-controlled scripts to calibrate devices to respond to the forces of the sun and wind. Environmental simulation, both within and outside the parametric modeling interface will give instant performance feedback, to further streamline the design process. To support this aim, the workshop will collaborate with the Environmental Engineering Design Agency, B.D.S.P. The goal is to create spatial organizations for various social programs, settings and building types, using different types of devices, such as natural-light reflecting light-shelves, natural-ventilation systems, and solar-shading brise-soleils to alleviate the effects of the harsh urban heat-island.

Open to design professionals and students from all over the world, the studio-based workshop will include instruction in parametric modeling, environmental simulation software, Rhino Grasshopper, GECO, and Galapagos, (to integrate parametric environmental optimization and simulation), as well as digital fabrication processes using laser cutter, C.N.C. milling and rapid-prototyping machines, sponsored by DS4 and SEACAM, all of which will be used to produce design proposals physical models and one-to-one scale prototypes. The course will be taught by tutors and assistants from the AA School and B.D.S.P. The Visiting School will also feature semi–nars and lectures by both Brazilian and international architects, artists, urban planners and other specialists, and be featured in international and national media including the Arquitetura e Urbanismo (AU) magazine and digital media.