Squared up – Build a home using squares and squares only

Squared up – Build a home using squares and squares only

PREMISE

Curves add a touch of excitement to anything static, but when it comes to functionality; straight elements are a crucial part of structures that are made anywhere.

Most buildings in ancient times used right angles in resonance with stable structures and were the only possible approach with the technology available back then.

Right angles have been attributed to efficiency in every aspect of our planet and this universe, right from laws of physics to human skeletal structures.

With times and technology shifting to curves as an aesthetic (Eg. Parametric Architecture), the power of rectilinear forms is overlooked with attribution to budget and mundane-ness.

What if squares are all we had? What if the only option to deliver a concept space for you was only rectilinear?

BRIEF

The qualm of using rectilinear forms usually comes into the spotlight when we look at generic urban environments at large. It creates this uneasiness of delivering average forms in the name of functionality.

When we look at the flip side, parametricism or deconstructivism on the converse can dominate the function as well while implemented to serve the spaces – hence the bias is not entirely accurate.

The exercise is focused on getting back to the basics, what if – all we had a single shape to design our buildings on? What if this shape’s positives and negatives were balanced out to make things work spatially and architecturally?

The challenge here would be constructing every element of a house to just one shape, a Square.

How would you as a designer interpret the qualities of the form in the physical realm of geometries translated into real forms?

How will the shape limitations help you shape a new experience through this form of limitation?