Analytic Geometries, Descriptive Geometries: Thinking and Making

At a time when design software and numerically-controlled fabrication are becoming ubiquitous and commonplace, this lecture-workshop lays the technical and conceptual foundations of computational geometry in architecture. Key topics include geometric descriptive and analytic models, conic and developable surfaces, complex parametric surface modelling, and (last but not least) the bottleneck of materiality. The syllabus is practical as well as theoretical, with special attention devoted to thinking through making. The course will offer weekly lectures and software tutorials on state-of-the-art development platforms such as Rhino-Grasshopper and MathCAD. Fabrication exercises will take place on location at the Autodesk Buildspace fablab in downtown Boston.