For the love of materials

For the love of Materials; A Pavilion made of gypsum, then stone & wood attempts to explore an architecture borne out of pure creative actions, through a material-led process; one in which each material is celebrated in a ‘designed sequence’, rather than – more typically – a ‘designed amalgamation’.

To start the process, a gypsum enclosure is sculpted and pulled to a high point, so it is visibly thin, contradictorily strong and vulnerable, and deliberately close to failing. As a result of this first action, a mending process is necessary using a second and third material, with specific characteristics. Strength is added to the weak areas of gypsum by adding dense, hand-crafted marble roses which add edge support to receive timber splints (in the form of yoke pairs and shores) which are joined with timber pins. Together they form a finely hand-crafted structural clasp. The shores are then ballasted to ground with pure gypsum boulder rock.

The project is an experiment that imagines a new form of creative agency made up of designers, engineers, salvage merchants, climate emergency activists, craftsmen and constructors, all operating responsively within a material-rescue economy, one in which the cumulative action sequence forms a new architectural language.

ENSA-V/Budget TBC/Completed.
Model: Blue styrofoam with  timber sticks and hagstones.