Sejima and Nishizawa have developed their work without explicitly referencing a theoretical discourse. However, they have stated that their housing projects describe their “architectural biography.” This study presents the hypothesis that systemic theories had influenced their housing projects at a spatial and constructive level. With the aim of testing it, the research produces four lines of results. Firstly, we observe that the word system is prominently current in a significant sample of their published texts. We describe how architects like Tominaga, Ito, Taki, and Shinohara, who influenced Sejima when she was still a student, discussed this concept inspired by Christopher Alexander’s texts. The second line brings together all the couple’s single-family housing projects published between 1987 and 2010 for the first time in a single document, as well as an original graphic-constructive reconstruction of the most outstanding ones. Thirdly, we unveil the emergence of four constructive patterns by applying these theories to the graphic material developed. Finally, we summarize the results in diagrams, showing the frequency, intensity, and continuity of the identified patterns in the four phases throughout the studied period. Verifying the hypothesis facilitates further research relate their domestic work and their other types of projects.

Work precincts are recognized for their significant role as generators of employment and associated commerce within urban areas. This study describes a method for analyzing the physical characteristics of urban work precincts in promoting the health and wellbeing of their occupants. The following physical parameters are analyzed: public transport accessibility, green and blue spaces, food environments, fitness facilities, supermarkets, and grocery stores. The parameters are assessed using quantitative spatial analysis based on street network data, as well as point of interest data acquired from OpenStreetMap (OSM). The streets and their intersections are stored in the OSM database as links and nodes, respectively. The evaluation of the performance metrics involves measuring the street network distance from each node to the closest node of interest for each parameter. The metrics are then combined, forming an urban health and wellbeing index (UHWI), which can be used to compare the performance of different precincts. The method was tested by investigating four work precincts in Sydney, Australia, all hosting a large office building belonging to the same business institution. Our results identified two of the four precincts with a high UHWI and resulted in the identification of one underperforming precinct.

The definition of urban form and its elements raises a wide debate in urban morphology. This study presents a proposal to understand the structuring of the urban landscape of Setif City over 170 years (1848-2018) by abstracting its main elements into permanent structure (PS_UL). It corresponds to the street network, more static to the change of the town plan, and flexible structure (FS_UL), more resilient to change and explains the superimpositions of morphological components (plot, building, and land use). This work aims to identify typological patterns of structures suggested in space-time through the inspection of the growth of the street network and the filling of morphological layers framed by the concept of urbanity. The methodology is based on syntactic (diachronic) morphogenetic analysis, with statistical analyses as unsupervised classification. Results indicate that PS_UL presents an accumulation of microincrements produced with a similar degree of coherence in different urban fabrics, which explain the local patterns of street network structuring. The typology of FS_UL patterns indicates an unbalanced growth by the arrangement between morphological elements, resulting in a variation in the degree of urbanity.

People around the world have shaped societies and urban spaces around water for millennia. They have transformed natural water structures and patterns to serve their diverse needs. The ways in which historical decisions affect contemporary water systems and influence future planning of urban systems still need to be fully recognized. This paper explores the multiple roles of water systems in Chang’an during the Western Han Dynasty. Chang’an, one of the ancient names for the city of Xi’an, was a typical capital city of China and East Asia in early ancient times. This study explores everyday practices pertaining to water as well as its role in defense, gardening, politics and culture.

Drawing upon three historical theories, this study presents findings that water was embedded in the design of traditional Chinese capitals. The siting and construction of capital cities was first based on the Theory of Choosing the Center (3rd century BCE) and the Theory of Conforming to Nature (5th–3rd century BCE). However, the final maturation of this urban morphology, including the water system, was closely related to the Theory of Symbolizing and Modeling Heaven and Earth (4th–3rd century BCE), in a way that manifested the imperial power’s organization and control of space and time.

Through close analysis of historical documents, archaeological reports and modern investigations, the paper aims to clarify, analyze and summarize the historical context and evolution, functional and structural characteristics, as well as the economic, political, cultural and military connotations of water systems in Chang’an. It argues that the coordination of urban construction and the water environment was a key foundation for capital city development. It proposes that people shaped urban water supply in many ways, including daily life, waterway transportation, agricultural irrigation, aquaculture promotion, military defense and fire prevention.

The water system in Chang’an also provided an important place for royalty and nobility to go fishing, to hunt and to engage in leisure and naval training. The landscape with this water system as the core, including Taiye Lake and Kunming Lake, had also inspired Chinese gardening history, and had a profound impact on future generations. More importantly, the capital’s urban morphology design was a miniature of the world recognized by the monarch, as well as the symbolic image of the supreme rulers’ political and cultural desire to control and possess Tianxia, which essentially means the whole world. In conclusion, the paper calls for a closer study of water-based design as a foundation for urban planning.

Climate change within the urban contexts is a crisis that cities are confronting globally. This issue poses numerous negative consequences such as thermal discomfort and increased energy usage within the building sector. This is especially the case in Western Sydney, Australia, where the average maximum temperature has risen by 7–8 °C within the past 30 years. This increase in temperature is highly concerning, since this region is witnessing rapid urban and infrastructural development and is proposed as the third-largest economy of Australia. Temperature changes in this region will also result in considerably increasing the electricity used for cooling purposes. This paper presents a parametric approach driven multi-objective optimization methodology to discover optimum design solution based on the urban microclimate and cooling energy demand of multi-functional buildings within this urban context. Mitigation measures including a range of design factors at both building (typology and window to wall ratio) and urban scales (aspect ratio and urban grid rotation) are further suggested for developing context sensitive optimum urban layouts. The resultant solutions indicate an improvement in urban thermal comfort, cooling and heating energy use by up to 25.85%, 72.76%, and 93.67%, respectively.

Urban vegetation is a nature-based solution for cooling cities. Under global warming and urban population growth, it is essential to optimize urban vegetation configuration in the urban area to bring maximum cooling benefit. This paper reviews 85 optimized urban vegetation configuration studies published from 2010 to 2020 to provide an insight into the most effective vegetation configuration for urban heat mitigation. Patterns and preferences in methods and the optimized greenery configurations are comprehensively analyzed. The results indicate that size, quantity, and layout of urban green space and the physiological characteristics and spatial arrangement of urban vegetation significantly influence their cooling effect. Additionally, two other research gaps were identified. First, more research needs to be done in southern hemisphere cities experiencing rapid urbanization and severe impacts of extreme weather. Second, a comprehensive method for quantifying interactions and cumulative effects of natural and artificial factors in the urban environment is required. Future study needs a holistic understanding of the interactive effects of vegetation spatial distribution on urban environment and climate for a more accurate analysis of optimal cooling greening layouts in large urban areas at multi-scales.

This paper presents an attempt to initiate community empowerment within the participatory neighbourhood upgrading context of the Şengül Hammam Neighbourhood (İstiklal). We adopted the Participatory Action Research methodology, which aims to generate knowledge meaningful for the community towards upgrading and revitalizing the neighbourhood. Respectively, a series of workshops, focus groups, and community activities were implemented in parallel processes with different neighbourhood groups. In order to change the situation in the neighbourhood, the inquiry began by mobilizing neighbourhood stakeholders and planning the future with primary school children. Later, this gained the active support of parents, women, the municipality, local leaders, and civil associations, and led them to take collective action over garbage collection, cleaning up the neighbourhood and building a playground-park. The mayor at the time of the research showed interest in İstiklal but did not or could not give any financial or political support to upgrade the physical setting as a whole. The lack of support from the municipality in that regard and the neighbourhood being left to its own destiny caused a gradual dilapidation and loss of historic and cultural values.

An adequate strategy for achieving energy efficiency when designing a photovoltaic shading system (PVSS) shall find an equilibrium between sunlight heat gain and daylight transmittances through effective analysis tools in a building’s early design phases. However, traditional simulation methods are either time-consuming or lacking architectonical thinking. This paper proposes a new method for architects to integrate thermal and daylighting performance by using parametric script modelling and optimize their balance with multi-objective optimization (MOO) algorithm in PVSS design. A case study was conducted to demonstrate the workflow of proposed integrated simulation method in PVSS design, and further compared the results with that of three single-objective optimizations under the same design requirement. The findings show that the integrated framework is a feasible method for PVSS design and can be extended into the design of other advance shading system or building integrated photovoltaic.

Architectural representation encompasses the means used to describe architectural entities. This discipline has long been under constant change due to architects’ everpresent desire for innovation. Algorithmic design (AD) is currently making its way into the plethora of representation methods that integrate the architect’s day-to-day work tools. However, it provides its fair share of controversy and hardship as it goes. This paper assesses whether AD is suitable as a representation method for architectural design by making a systematic analysis of this medium as a contemporary representation method. Specifically, we investigate (1) its birth and evolution as a means of representation, (2) the characteristics that make it simultaneously appealing and off-putting to the architectural community, (3) the influence of technological evolution and education on its proliferation, and (4) its capacity to represent design problems in comparison to the currently predominant means of digital architectural representation, that is, computer-aided drafting and building information modeling.

Enriched environments in animal models have demonstrated that exposure to an optimal stimulus improves behavior, cognition, and genomics. However, the evidence base for the neurophysiological influence of human environment enrichment has not been extensively studied. This systematic review compiles indicators about the effect of built, indoor environments on the cognitive processes of memory and attention in humans. This work pursues two main objectives: (1) to define current knowledge and the methods that are useful and identify whether previously published studies indicate consistencies and (2) to report the approaches and strategies that can be used in evaluating cognitive processes affected by environment response. Results of this systematic review show that (1) form and geometry, (2) space distribution and context, (3) color and texture, (4) height, width, and enclosure, (5) transition and circulation, and (6) light, sound, and temperature have an impact on memory and/or attention, and they can be assessed objectively. Despite all the advances in this field, methodological limitations and a lack of cross-validated standard protocols are found. Therefore, future research is necessary to provide a deep insight into how human cognition can be heightened by the environment to which it is exposed.

This paper aims to provide an efficient and straightforward structural form-finding method for designers to extrapolate component forms during the conceptual stage. The core idea is to optimize the classical method of structural form-finding based on principal stress lines by using parametric tools. The traditional operating process of this method relies excessively on the designer’s engineering experience and lacks precision. Meanwhile, the current optimization work for this method is overly complicated for architects, and limitations in component type and final result exist. Therefore, to facilitate an architect’s conceptual work, the optimization metrics of the method in this paper are set as simplicity, practicality, freedom, and rapid feedback. For that reason, this paper optimizes the method from three aspects: modeling strategy for continuum structures, classification processing of data by using the k-nearest neighbor algorithm, and topological form-finding process based on stress lines. Eventually, it allows architects to create structural texture with formal aesthetics and modify it in real time on the basis of structural analysis results. This paper also explores a comprehensive application strategy with internal force analysis diagramming to form-finding. The finite element analysis tool Karamba3D verifies the structural performance of the form-finding method. The performance is compared with that of the conventional form, and the comparison results show the practicality and potential of the strategy in this paper.

The analogy between the human body and architectural structures dates all the way back to ancient times and has significantly shaped the design of buildings and structures. The article examines the body’s historical influence on how structures are perceived and designed, demonstrating how the body shapes the “technical truth” dimension of structural design while oblivious to the importance of an “artistic truth” or perceptual dimension. This article aims to connect recent neuroscience findings and their implications for structural design through graphic statics and its design methods. Finally, this article proposes an equilibrium-based structural design approach for designing embodied structures based on graphic statics.