Simulated Result

Instead of powdering concrete, which consumes a considerate amount of energy, the project involves cutting concrete into quads and reusing them in new construction. To investigate the potential of the reused concrete panels, the approach is to use Curved Crease Folding (CCF) as the primary design method. This creates component-based spatial modules using CCF frameworks. A unique property of CCF allows designers to create 3-D geometries using 2-D shapes that are composed of reused concrete quads. To optimize the efficiency of the reused materials, each materials will be given an ID to track the status. Material bank is a digital system to categorize and manage the reused stock. We propose a gamified platform that helps stakeholders reach consensus and allows for implementation of architectural proposals in the physical world. It enables users to visualize and interact with their customized environment in a virtual space. The project promotes the densification through gamified platform and spatial geometry. The platform provides an interactive way to engage in the process of demolition and reuse, incentivizing users to customize spatial environment with reused materials. The spatial geometry builds up a foundation for these to be implemented into virtual platform. The project ensures the process is ecologically and economically viable, creating a win-win situation for all involved.

Site location

The site is located at the centre of St.Paul Cathedral, the borough market, and London Eye. after connected city of London and southbank by millennium bridge, enabling the tate modern Museum draw lots of tourists and local people to gather around. However, there are not much activities available near the riverfront.

Site conditions

Therefore, to take this opportunity, we decided to densify the area by converting this area into a mixed cultural and retail district. the site contains luxury apartments, some bad condition housing buildings, and the Sampson house. Based the analysis, the proposing site has a potential to be a cultural district mixed with retail, cultural, residential and hotels. And then, the grid will be generated based on the inputs of the site such as ground connection, green spaces, river and bridge. With different game starting points, the grid will be different as well. In our case, we developed 2 grids which starts with different anchor attractions for the whole site.

The users can browsing the site to have a better understanding of surrounding environments to help them make better decisions. Which can also supply some basic site information such as location, traffic, program distributions, etc.

Users will select clusters within the site. To start the game, players need to place anchor modules on the selected clusters, and the anchor module will be the center of the site which will affect the strategies of each player. After chose the anchor activities, they can start to place modules, and the module will be based on the role they selected, also they can choose whether to use recycled materials such as reused concrete slabs. If they chose to use these concrete slabs, they can get carbon offsets so the price of the module will be less then regular ones. While placing the modules, there are also some restrictions if player choose to have specific rights such as air rights and view rights enabling players to create unique exterior spaces. And the rights will cost less than buying new modules, so player will be encouraged creating interesting spaces instead of stacking rigidly. At the same time, they can also customize the terrace for their modules, and the cost will depend on the size of extension. After the process of placing, the players can start to negotiate with others to connect the terrace if they want to. After the modules are all placed and set. Players can start units customization, they are able to choose presets of activities or customize their own. If there is conflict with other players, they can also negotiate with them to make changes easily. Within the unit customization, the process is easy and able to create a vivid virtual experience of the space to help them make better decisions about their customization. The video shows an example of customizing a bookstore and a restaurant. After the customization, the player can experience the space they created virtually, and then they can go back to unit customization if need to. With the platform, the players can create different outcomes based on the strategy they used, and also allowing non-expert users to create their own spatial environment.

Commercial voxels

Activity voxels can be selected and placed into different modules to create customized spaces.