The Urban Morphogenesis Lab is a research and teaching environment, as a part of the BPRO at the Bartlett School of Architecture. The Lab experiments with the application of recent scientific findings within unconventional computing to various design scales, from objects to architecture and urbansphere. The aim of its research is to mobilise artificial and biological intelligence into the search of a new mode of reasoning and therefore designing, within a complex milieu where multiple degrees of stability, instability as well as diversity coexist, aiming to transform the act of design into the possibility of hacking into natural as well as artificial morphogenetic processes, in real time and designate novel realms of operations.
The projects presented here engage with the notion of synthetic territories at different levels and scales, aiming to develope design models beyond standard conventions of size and function. Methodologically the Urban Morphogenesis Lab operates within a speculative assemblage of objects which we have termed 'Objects with Universal Relevance' (O.U.R.). Each O.U.R. aims to allow novel tactics of interaction to emerge, whilst various models, supported by collective intelligence and spatial memory, reveal universal intervention strategies. Bottom-up and top-down models of planning become obsolete methods in the wake of O.U.R.
In this three years cycle of research, we are focusing on silk production, history, research and it's
repercussion on the Urban.
Contemporary Cities are built for humans but host more than humans, artificial as well biological intelligence are part of city life. Birds, insects, microbes, molds and many others non-human entities share the urbansphere with us, colonizing buildings and streets, while occupying strata that are usually not perceived by human sensibility.
We have been collaborating with scientists to discover whether a wider model of co-living can be designed, where non-human entities are mobilised, re-oriented and choreographed, shaping layers of the urban environment and triggering the emergence of inhuman cities.
Comments