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Parametric architecture

51 buildings

Parametric architecture designs buildings with algorithms: the architect sets input parameters, and the model changes as they change. Patrik Schumacher coined the term parametricism in 2008 and described it as a successor to modernism and postmodernism. In it, every element of a design can vary and adapt to the others. It rejects both serial repetition and a heap of unrelated pieces, aiming for complex space that stays legible. Its early practitioners included Greg Lynn, Jesse Reiser, Lars Spuybroek and Kas Oosterhuis. Grasshopper, built on Rhino, is a visual programming tool for such models.

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Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Bilbao (1997) came before the name, its titanium curves drawn with CATIA, aerospace software. UNStudio's Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart (2006) winds double-helix ramps on a trefoil plan. Zaha Hadid's MAXXI in Rome (2010) braids concrete galleries under a roof of light fins, and her Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku (2012) folds one continuous surface from plaza to roof, with no line between wall and ground. Shenzhen Bao'an International Airport Terminal 3 (2013), by Studio Fuksas, wraps a 1.6 km terminal in a double honeycomb skin pierced by hexagonal openings.

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