Eroding the Barriers

摘要

As technology collapses traditional hierarchies, and promotes the transgression of disciplines, the barriers between architect and builder are being eroded. SHoP's work attempts to explore and improve the effectiveness with which new techniques can be exported to the built realm. Driven by programme and technique, as opposed to formal or stylistic considerations, Dunescape (an 'urban beach' installation in the courtyard of the P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center], was deployed and configured as a landscape in which surface, structure and programme were collapsed into a singular entity, articulated through a triangulated frame that accommodated programme shifts by varying the position of each frame relative to the next. Changes in surface and loading conditions were met by altering the angle, depth and locus of triangulation within each frame. Rather than the traditional set of descriptive drawings, the construction documents were full-scale colour-coded templates for manufacture and assembly of the frames. The simplicity of the system, comprising only two components (2 x 2 cedar sticks and 3-inch wood screws), fostered an accelerated learning curve, and construction was 'fast tracked' with templates and materials for each day's work arriving on site as the installation progressed.