METABOLIC DESIGN

A Metabolic design is a set od interralated processes that allows growth, reproduction, etc.
It is understood as a closed cycle of mutual interralationship of the componets, able to recreate again and again, constantly changing, evoluting.
A Metabolic design should be resilient, self-sufficient, part of our living system.

Space – Time -  Matter – Energy – Information

PROGRAMME/ CONTEXT

The disgn of Architectural interventions that can negotiate and integrate with socio-cultural and geo-political or to a building system that involves its own production, etc.

POLYVALENCE AND DESIGNED SYSTEMS

The projects embrance a multi-systematic logic to design and materiality that seeks to synthesize architecture as an ecosystem involving many different species operating in a complex and interdependent way. The draw on number of different design systems, cooperating as a coherent architectural outcome, both within their internal relations and their relations to the outside world.

MYCOLOGY Architecture propose a metabolic cycle that integrates multiscalar processes creating a interaction between people and nature. It is a proposal for a prototype of a mycoforestry process for Collserola Natural Park of Barcelona.

Collserola lies fully within the area of Mediterranean influence, characterized by mild winters, hot and dry summers, moderate annual thermal oscillation and seasonal rainfall which is, overall, low and highly irregular, ending on high rates of fires.

The symbiosis process between mycelium and agricultural waste is necessarly required to increase natural and social capital of this former agricultural city.

MATERIAL ARE ORIGINATED FROM THE SITE

The agricultural waste is re-cycle and re-invented into in-situ biomaterial which act as a mycofiltration system for the “Mesias“ and other urbanized areas of Collserola  and as a mycomembrane for Mycoforestry.

It will be solidified by microbial agent called “mycelia“ or roots of mushroom, then grows itself as a living material and evolves into a living architecture for food (mushroom) production, public recreation, soil moisture retention and erosion resistant soils.

Finally the architecture will be biodegradable into a fertilizer (mycorestoration) as a close-loop design back into the soil.

WE GROW ARCHITECTURE

The young material which has wetness or soft bodies are solidified to hard and dry as it is cured by heat, and within the proximity of branches when it is wet, emerging the self-binding property, as it appears in mycelium foraging pattern, that enables the rigidity of the whole geometry more stronger.

Hence, an evolutionary design strategy has been used to incorporate material cycles with architectural program cycles through time based adapt-ability, grow-ability and decompose-ability.

Material Research

You could find a complete information of the project in the following link:

http://issuu.com/silvia.oliva11/docs/booklet_som

Video of the Mycofiltation Proposal:

https://youtu.be/DZF1Fq0otqQ

Metabolic pixel 2.0: A Cycle within Cycles.

This project focuses on utilising bio-waste in a variety of techniques. The idea is to incorporate IaaC’s city campus and Valldaura campus into one metabolic cycle. Furthermore, this process will aid at benefiting the Valldaura campus with an energy supply through composting food waste from both campuses, in the hills and city. This composting process produces a considerable amount of bio gas that consists mainly of Methane. Through extracting this Methane, energy for heating and cooking can be produced and stored depending on rate of use.

When the composting material is at optimum conditions, the rise in gas production rate results in high pressure. This discovery presented an opportunity to utilise said pressure in various structural aspects. Being able to control the speed and rate of gas production creates the opportunity for manipulation of structure through inflation vs. deflation or expansion vs. contraction. This, in turn, can be used in different scales ie. through combination with PV, Shading devices to create a selective greenhouse effect using minimal gas output to create maximum coverage.

The Metabolic pixel 2.0 aka the “MethLAB” is a small scale composting machine that can be stationed at many locations in Valldaura. In the next few weeks we will conduct further site analysis to select the optimum locations for placement. Using a “satellite” effect, a number of pixels will be placed in said locations and tested. This method will increase coverage and mobility of the structure thus creating a more efficient cycle.

FOOD WASTE  —> STRUCTURE  —->  ENERGY