Just Throw It!!! : A Preliminary Study Of Non-Contact Construction Based On Block Interlocking

The current sustainability paradigm relies on conventional market-driven practices, which result in a slow transformation, as buildings are the sum of products in conventional construction processes. This project proposes to rethink the performance of the ‘parts’ and their aggregation mechanism into the ‘whole’ to explore an alternative construction paradigm. An example of carbon-neutral construction can be found in nature by animal agents (ants, bees, beavers, etc). They repurpose available materials—such as twigs, mud, soil, and stones— while humans build new products for construction. They build around the surroundings best optimized for function (lighting, ventilation, water), while human structures dictate nature and customize the environment to suit the construction. The actions of animals are radically simple (stack, drop, jam, or rarely weave) to create a randomly packed system [1], while human construction is heterogeneous, using complex human-to-machine collaboration to manage products. Despite the simplicity of animal agents, their collective abilities are highly intelligent, sustainable, and energy-efficient. Some recent scholarly interest in advancements in robotics, construction automation, and swarm robotics-activated self-assembly algorithms has also been inspired by nature [2], while recognizing the need for new hardware and interdisciplinary research [3]. By learning from construction in nature and emerging data-driven robotic construction methods, this prototype explores the performance of ‘stacking.’ The physical process of novel stacking and jamming could provide new insights into architectural sustainability by achieving structural stability through unique interlocking methods, without relying on permanent bonding agents.