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2017 Best of Design Awards for Research

Snap On, Snap Off

2017 Best of Design Awards for Research

2017 Best of Design Award for Research: Snapping Facade

Designer: Jin Young Song (University at Buffalo, Dioinno Architecture)
Location: Conceptual

Snapping Facade explores a sustainable design strategy that utilizes elastic instability to create dynamic motion at the building envelope. The current dynamic shading systems adopt either glass enhancement or motorized mechanical movement. This study introduces snapping-induced motion as an alternative actuation mechanism to control apertures, and proposes Snapping Facade as a new dynamic shading system. Based on analytical and numerical study, the researchers fabricated the assembly of a prototype snapping facade and validated the hand-operated snapping motion. The proposed snapping facade suggests a novel way to recycle the strain energy stored in structures via elastic instability.

“This is a novel idea that could serve as a precursor for more facade-related projects in the future.” —Matt Shaw, senior editor, The Architect’s Newspaper (juror)

Project engineer:
Jongmin Shim

Research team:
William Baptiste, Jing Jiang, Hakcheol Seo, Andrew Koudlai

 

Honorable Mention

Project: The Framework Project
Architect: Lever Architecture with the Framework Project
Location: Portland, Oregon

Framework is a 90,000-square-foot, 12-story project that is slated to become the first wood high-rise in the U.S. Approval for the project required 40 tests to demonstrate mass timber’s fire, structural, and seismic safety. The testing data will be made public to support a regulatory path for high-rise wood structures and encourage wider adoption of mass timber in the U.S.

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