Prefabrication experiments - 379 - State of the Art - 09 - Platforms, Kits, Industrialized Building Systems

 

Since the publication of Bridging the Gap Between Construction and Manufacturing by UK firm Bryden Wood in 2017, there has been a theoretical shift in the offsite construction industry; Architectural design driven by virtual modelling and data management has initiated a new era for industrialized construction based on a theory of platforms. Platforms relate to both software and hardware. Software circumscribes a project's centralized data management strategy and real-time cloud-shared content among all shareholders. Hardware as described by the authors of the now famous report, points to a kit-of-parts methodology imagined to produce buildings that share architectural, material and functional characteristics. Like many ideas in prefabrication, while discussed as innovative, this kit-of-parts, open source, collaborative form of industrialized building is hardly new. Architects like Walter Segal, Ezra Ehrenkrantz and theorist N. John Habraken argued for similar approaches, systemically layering for Ehrenkrantz' School Construction Development System, the separation of supports and infill in Habraken's case, and shared building methods for Segal. All can be deemed early applications of platform theory in architecture.

 

Arguably one of the most ambitious uses of platform theory before it was titled as such was Renzo Piano's Rigo Quarter in Corciano Italy, designed and built from 1978 to 1982. Based on rigorous modular coordination and repeatable parts, Piano's work used a combination of systemic layering and separating structure and infill to produce a large-scale urban development scheme. Co-designed through workshops with future occupants, the organization is based on a 6m. grid for arranging plans, section and topological aggregations.  The kit included precast concrete components for party walls (supports) that divide the landscape into cellular 50 - 120 square meter flats. Internal elements, off the rack posts, service cores, joists and girders along with curtain wall elements made it possible to adjust designs based on basic elements. Piano's design at Corciano is a very impressive scheme of platform construction that freely adapts to a terraced landscape. Adapting to site has not always been a strength off offsite construction, Piano's work shows an imaginative way of achieving site specific standardization.

Above: Platform by Bryden Wood ;
Below: Rigo Quarter by Renzo Piano