This is the video from the project’s presentation at the Design Probes Exhibition in Vienna, earlier this month.

In its current stage, the research has investigated the state of the art in CFD integration through a number of key experiments – design probes – with similar objectives that aim to assess the potential and pitfalls of the available tools. Namely:

• A large scale 3D printed clay wall, constructed in real scale as part of the Open Thesis Fabrication programme at the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia, with the objective to use the geometry of the wall to enhance its environmental performance.
• A workshop on earthen shell structures in collaboration with ESR15 Stephanie Chaltiel, with an objective to optimize the structure’s openings for natural ventilation.
• A research project on phase changing materials at the Centre for Information Technology and Architecture and in collaboration with Kieran Timberlake, with an objective to inform a real-time multi-scalar simulation framework.

This review of the current state of advancement of integrated CFD simulation tools in computational design has demonstrated the limited capabilities in modelling and simulating airflow problems. Driven by this conclusion, the thesis aims to develop of an integrated CFD solver that would allow designers to get performance insight on air-flow related problems within their computational design framework.