Expression and Evidence, Advances in Architecture Studio Pedagogy

Abstract

Energy simulation software has been available for several years, increasingly affordable and accessible by both architecture offices and the academy. The most prominent barrier to truly synthesizing and reconciling architectural design studio education methods with energy consumption literacy and calculation has been the complexity of software and often associated technical knowledge requirements. While the singularly gifted student may be able to navigate complex modeling software and complete architectural design studies concurrently, we observe that it is more often the case that modeling typically drives students toward two divergent outcomes. On the one hand, students find the modeling so compelling that their architectural design outcomes fail to be particularly culturally compelling or beautiful but are simulated to perform well. On the other hand, students become frustrated with the modeling parameters and limitations and ignore the modeling system in favor of design expression. Some pedagogical breakthroughs have been realized in our experience by using schematic design level energy simulation software in architecture design education. This paper develops a compelling thesis for architecture design education pedagogy that fuses the competing design agenda of expression and simulated energy consumption modeling, supported by examples of student work.