Research's IaaC - Students Research - Self-sufficient Housing Prototypes

The water habitat should be understood as a larger strategy defined by a double structured “machine” – under water and upper – are part of the same system, constantly negotiating with the environment – with different scales – and promoting an intensive interaction between them trough the water dynamics cycle. A component is designed to perform both as a water purification system and a space generator able to adjust, modify and characterize an environment. This component is multiplied in its several combinations either technical either space generator, creating a field with different degrees of concentration and porosity, defining a neighborhood. The domesticy of the neighborhood is recognized trough the strong negotiation promoted in the intermediate spaces and the rotation of the membranes that react to that social dynamic interaction. The neighborhood is also understood as a ground of energetic efficiency where sufficiency is recognized as a plural strategy towards a global benefit. By Abel Patacho, Theodora Christoforidou

Adaptive microclimates is a prototype that through a caving system creates different microclimates. Through a gradient of different size of caves, controls the temperature according to the external inputs. The final project is situated at the delta d’ebre at the isla de buda and as a landscape manipulates the rising of the water level due to the tides. The bigger cavities with fewer connections are at the sea side controlling the waves and stabilising the coastline, and the smaller ones with more connections are at the side of the lagoon manipulating the water circulation for cultivations. The program emerges from the different situations and microclimates. The landscape systems extrudes at 3 point responding to the three different site-zones of the site, in order to accept habitable spaces. At the lagoon coast the main activity that emerges is the cultivation of algas, at the dry sand land the salt drying, and at the sea coast emerge fishing activities. Thus the prototype system adapts each time to the different environmental conditions and the program and living activities emerge and adapt to the different microclimates. By Chiara Farinea, Froso Charamboulous, Panagiota Piperidou

The topography of an hilly region near El Perello town (Catalunya, Spain) and its climate (in terms of sun and wind) become in principal the departing point in the creation of a clustering prototype with the capability to adjust to these different conditions. The clusters are the grouping of living environments organized around working environments. Since one of the main economic engines of the area is the production of bee honey and fruity-colture, the introduction of bee farming as a programmatic element becomes the organizing factor and the sustaining element for the community. Bees are capable of very quickly start a colony just by the relocation of one queen. In the same way, the community can expand and generate new clusters. By Alfonso Pezzi, Diego Camargo

Generated as an eco machine from the natural logarithmic curvature of Nautilus (under water sea creature) and in further development algorithmic rules were applied to this machine prototype to generate the final selfsufficient housing prototype. At the chosen site Vinaroz where this Prototype acts as a socio cultural as well as an economically sustainable livable space. This housing prototype is connected with the sea shore where the beach acts as a buffer space for the housing and the urban space. After studying the site condition it was found that the necessity of this site which can be combined with the housing prototype to make it self sufficient. The data and findings lead us to design a livable space that can work all the year as an economically viable socio cultural space. By Anna Szloser, Asaduzzaman Rassel

The starting point of the project is the consideration of the symbiotic dynamics of the lichens, that is based on two processes that are common to most of the ecosystems: photosynthesis and fermentation. The element of the symbiotic system in the case of our housing system are human and plants. The house unit is divided, according to the symbiotic principle, in two fields: the down one dedicated to the fermentation process, and related to the decomposition of organic waste of plants, digestion of waste and production of biogas, and the upper one, dedicated to photosyntesis, plant growing, water collection and storage. By Fabiano Spano, Berardo Matalucci

Conjugating living and working, this housing-research prototype starts with the minimum occupation of land space, and expands when in need of more space to adapt itself to the quantity of users. It is configured with a combination of fixed modules, expandable ones, and a series of columns that mold themselves to capture sunlight. All covered with a continuous skin that helps to merge the prototype into its surrounding landscape. By Karlo de Soto M., Chrysokona Mavrou, Gabriella Castellanos

A new type of community life, created for the fishermen and other seasonal individuals in Ebro’s Delta, Tarragona. Where, after a study of forms based on the hexagon and the golden rhombus, a new typology of pods was chosen by their ability to unfold and communicate the spaces according to needs and time in the day. The whole project works on solar energy, aided by the water of the bay where is placed. There are 3 types of pods: living, social and connection. By Natalia Miranda, Cristobal Bernal

The wetland of Ebro Delta tends to loose the half of its land. The River Ebro discharges less than 1% of what the river used to discharge at the beginning of the 20th century. The dams, the fall in precipitation in its drainage basin and the excess use of water for irrigation cause the decrease of sediments transported to the area, resulting in the recession of certain sections of the delta. The reduction in flow encourages the intrusion of salt water that penetrates the river underneath the fresh water and reduces its depth, affecting important ecosystems that exist in the area. The proposed structure aims to direct different types of sediments through different angles and degrees of porosity, creating various ecosystems in time, which can evolve in emerged environments through the re-configuration of the landscape. Catalogues of porosity applied in cell configurations and various cell surfaces, using the voronoi tool, are used to define the protocol of differentiation and variation depending on the size of sediment and the desired degree of perforation in each area of the site. By Fani Natou, Fotis Vasilakis

An intervention in the Delta of the Ebro, is a very delicate procedure. For this case the decision was taken to develop a series of nonpermanent houses, that can be used by different target populations. This populations groups reflect the different cycles of the place, agriculture, tourism, leisure, etc. There are three layers involved. First, a series of control points related to renewable energy (wind and geothermal) this control points are connected to a series intermediate control points which have sensors that react to the activity and provide general services for the population. Finally the individual tents are connected to these spots. This scheme is quite flexible and allows for multiple reconfigurations of space, of cooperation among people, etc. Depending on the people that are inhabiting this temporal housing, the time of the year and other factors, the field has a different blooming of these tents or looks almost undisrupted. We want to create a landscape that is intelligent and not just something to be seen. By Guillermo Iván López Domínguez

This project tries to find some real self-sufficient ways to create a house that is not the compromise one in the aspect of self-sufficiency. The idea of this project is mainly from the traditional Chinese agriculture which name is the mode of paddy field with the mulberry trees. With the studying of this mode plus the methane, I find several benign cycles of self-sufficient house that meet the modern life’s requirement. From this basement, I develop this rotatable house. It should be acclimatization house. And the houses can communicate easily by the rotating of themselves in the neighborhood that make up of this kind house. It can show some figure ground characters from the process of the rotating. At last the digital fabric to show the form of this house model also is an interesting thing. By Zhao Honghao