The Economics of Digital Fabrition for sustainable housing in slums by Bongani Muchemwa

The economics of digital Fabrication and design for sustainable housing in slums

Raw materials

Laser cutter, cutting the raw materials to be assembled Designer on a computer

Fabricating building

Bongani Elton Muchemwa yr3

Questions

What is digital fabrication and what role has digital fabrication played in Architecture. What is a slum. Fabrication of housing in the slum city: could digital design and fabrication solve the housing issue in the rising economies? •What can we learn from frank Gehry and how has he managed to lower the cost of his complex designs. •At a lower scale, what can we learn from ShoP Architects?, how have they made their projects efficient and cost effective. And could those techniques be parachuted to the slums.

•How can Architects Designers intervene in slums with the Aid of digital fabrication? - a look at the work of architect Larry Sass William Massie and Neil Gershenfeld‟s Fablabs. • conclusion future of digital fabrication- computing is predicted to grow ever faster and smarter in the next 10-20 year, what effects would this have on the cost of digital fabrication equipment. Would it be affordable in future there for guarantying housing for many in the slum cities.

The economics of digital Fabrication and design for sustainable housing. Could digital design and fabrication solve the housing issue in the rising mega-slums?

Select bibliography Journals 1. AD-Architectural design- Programming cultures (art and architecture in the age of software) guest editor Mike silver. July/august 2006. 2. AD-Architectural design- versioning: (evolutionary techniques in architecture) guest edited by SHoP/ Sharples Holden Pasquarelli. Vol 72 no 5 Sept/Oct 2002. Books. 1. Blobitecture (waveform architecture and digital design). Author-John Kevin 2003. 2. Architecture in the digital age design and manufacturing. Edited by Branko kolarevic, Authors and contributors (Rorbet Aish, Mark Burry, Bernard Cache, Bernhard Franken, James Glymph, \mark Goulthorpe, Sulan Kolatan,Chris LuebKeman, Brendan MacFarlane, William J Mitchell, Jon H. Pittman, Ali Rahim, Antonio Saggio, Hugh Whitehead, Chris Yessios, Norbert Young. Published 2003. Essays articles and research Papers 1. Digital surface representation and the constructability of Gehryâ&#x20AC;&#x;s Architecture by Dennis R. Sheldon. Submitted to the to the department of Architecture on August 2002. In partial fulfilment of the requirement of doctor of philosophy in the field of architecture: design computation. Source- ddf.mit.edu. Website essays, Journals 1. ESSAYS ON SCIENCE AND SOCIETY:A Tale of Two Cities: Architecture and the Digital Revolution. sourcewebsite. Author- William J. Mitchell Science 6 August 1999:Vol. 285. no. 5429, pp. 839 - 841 DOI: 10.1126/science.285.5429.83. Source website www.sciencemag.org. 2. Daring, Modernist Homes -- on the Cheap, Architect William Massie's innovative designs go directly from PC construction site, cutting costs dramatically. Author Thane Peterson of Bussness week. www. businessweek.com 3. The Instant House: A production system for construction with digital fabrication Authors Lawrence Sass and Marcel Botha; MIT 2006 ddf.mit.edu. 4. NSF Annual Report CCR-0122419 2005 Activities and Findings: source cba.mit.edu. Author - Millner, 2005 5. World Development Report 2004 ,source : econ.worldbank.org 6. (Home delivery) New Orleans digital fabricated homes, source www.aia.org, author- Lawrence Sass Massachusetts Institute of Technology Department of Architecture Lectures and talks 1. (Shadow Cities) TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) lecture of 2005, Robert Neuwirth. www.ted.com 2. (Neil Gershenfeld on Fab Labs) TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) lecture February 2007 Neil Gershenfeld www.ted.com 3. (Cameron Sinclair on open-source architecture) l TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design Lecture 2005 Statistics 1. Global mapping of slums and slum growth: graphs and pictograms. source www.worldmapper.org.

Introduction. A 2008 report by the United nation‟s commission on population and development entitled “population distribution, urbanisation, internal migration and development” estimates that our great cities will grow even larger. Moreover gigantic cities will bloom in developing nations in the next 20-50 years. In my opinion, the ventures of architecture and the city will not only grow in complexity but in influence and effect in the exploits of citizens. Robert Nuewirth the author of shadow cities, a book that seeks to understand the goings on in slums and squatter cities claims 1.4 million people per week are moving into the cities but most of them into mega slums . The question is perhaps how do we house all these people in sustainable housing. The Director of MIT‟s Centre for Bits and Atoms and the FabLabs (digital fabrication laboratories)("Fabulous Fabrications", The Economist, March 23, 2005,) Neil Gershenfeld agues that “we have had a digital revolution, we have won, and what is coming now is a revolution in digital fabrication in which the virtual meets the physical” he says in a TED Talk (technology entertainment and design) lecture of 2006. In the present time the increase of computing power has cumulated in superior digital representation, calculation and manufacturing, this has only sparked yet another revolution in architecture. And architecture and digital fabrication is probably in my opinion going to be equipped to solve the mass housing issue for the growing mega slums and cities. On the other hand, I think the overall image of computing in architecture is seen as decadent and the rise of mass computerised production, where designers or cad monkeys as they call them are slotted into cubical to produce drawings for more boxes and cubical for other people to be slotted into as well. Some notable architects are even criticising each other, saying some practises are being run by software rather than people. Otherwise I think, computers have the capacity to do good for architecture but this is an argument which is beyond the scope of the essay. “The forces of technology and economics have as of yet by no means been universally favourable to architecture as a profession, nor necessarily to builders, owners or consumers of design; yet there is a resurgence of interest in design as an economic differentiator, which has unfolded parallel to the evolution of design technologies, that appears as a counterforce to the ongoing commoditisation of both tools and practice.” says Denis R Shelden, the director at Gehry technologies. I agree with his assumption, it seems that there has been a discovery of cost cutting benefits of digital fabrication in projects that architects like Greg Lynn, Frank Gehry, Norman Foster and ShoP have and are currently working on, scaling down that process into the slums and favelas would mean cheap and sustainable housing, and this is perhaps were the Fablab have been successful, in parallel projects. Digital fabrication has been sold as the saviour of the little old lady in the village in Ghana, through the FabLabs in the realm of product design, enabling products that would be expensive to custom build using analogue production techniques to be built at a very low price. Basically, traditional analogue manufacturing/ fabrication methodologies are inefficient at low volumes, and much of today‟s high-volume production is moving to low-cost labour markets overseas in almost every industry that makes objects, all the way up to buildings. Economies-of-scale are necessary to spread large set-up costs across many units, making oneoffs and low-volume runs inefficient.

Slum dwellings in soweto south Africa. Image : Benedict Kurzen/VII Network, for The New York Times

Invention kits let you build (almost) anything Creator of Fab Lab helps people get means to create their own technology Image of Neil Gershenfeld physicist and MIT professor, is the inventor of what he calls the Fab Lab photographer Bill Cramer / Forbes.com

Over the period from 1990 to 2001, the population living in slums increased by 220 million. The largest growth was in Southern and Eastern Asia. These regions already had the largest total populations living in slums. The biggest increases in population living in slums were in China, India and Nigeria. These territories have the largest populations in each of their respective regions. Poorer territories have experienced greater slum growth than richer territories. Nevertheless, the number of people living in legally insecure housing of poor quality has increased in 85% of territories from 1990-2001.

Produced by the SASI group (Sheffield) and Mark Newman (Michigan)

slums in Mumbai, Photograph: David Levene.

Kibera Slums, Nairobi Frances Woodhams

Slums of Jakarta, Indonesia photographer Indonesia foundation.

Argument and structure of the essay. To begin with, I believe it is appropriate to discuss the economics of large scale and complex architecture to find out how the achievements and techniques in such projects can be transferred to sustainable housing, and the steps that technology is allowing Architect Frank Gehry‟s practice to achieve their extraordinary designs. Denis Sheldon the director at Gerhy technologies remarks in his p.h.d thesis, “this position may surprise readers. It is sometimes assumed that Gehry‟s practice engages predominately or exclusively in “budget less” projects, with clients for whom money is no object. This is far from the truth. The firm has achieved its successful track record of completed projects by providing buildings within clients‟ budgets, and within the rough per square foot costs of more conventional projects of similar building usage types”. These achievements have been attributed to the office use of digital fabrication to realise their designs. The assumption is that digital fabrication is at the heart of making frank Gerhy‟s designs feasible and economical. In the essay are am not going to dwell too much on software, hardware or the theories of digital architecture but investigate through the design process and fabrication techniques that have been used to manufacture and build buildings which have been arguably complex and expensive and impossible to build without digital fabrication technologies, I will analyse these design techniques that may solve current global problems of architecture, mainly the mega slums; and at the same time critic the possibility and the notion that digital fabrication could solve mega slums, as the digital divide still separate the west from the third world. On the other hand, I will critically analyse the lessons learnt from the Frank Gerhy‟s design processes, and try deduce if they are relevant or related to the slum city. It is ironic to think that the mega slum and Frank Gerhy could be related. And finally speculate in which direction these technologies and techniques may lead to in the future. However the arguments will be supported by Architects like Larry Sass: professor at MIT‟s Architecture department who is leading the research on digital fabricated housing for economical housing in South Africa‟s shanty/slum towns in conjunction with the FABLAB (MIT‟s global digital fabrication laboratories); ShoP: a New York based practice who are also developing designs and techniques for economical public and residential Architecture using digital fabrication and finally William Massie : an Architect-in-Residence and a professor at the University of Montana also in the forefront of inexpensive digitally fabricated housing. I will also look at the work of Neil Gershenfeld Director of MIT‟s Centre for Bits and Atoms and the FabLabs.

Bottom left Larry Sass: architect and professor at MIT‟s Architecture department and his research group developing digitally fabricated housng for slum towns of south Africa. This approach promises to reduce the cost of construction in time, labour, and materials, and even more importantly to enable rapid customization of low-cost construction that is responsive to local needs [Sass, 2005; Sass and Botha, 2006]. Image: MIT department of Architecture and planning. mit.com

Fabrication of Architecture in the slum city: could the digital fabrication solve the problem of housing a rising global population. Digital design and fabrication perhaps on the surface seem to be the answer to some global problems one being which the rapid increase in population into our major cities and in turn increasing demand in housing, especially in the rising economies, at present the majority of people in these new cities live in appalling conditions. The concern of philanthropists and the western culture is to provide a higher standard of living and stable conditions for these communities. However, because of limited long term resources for maintenance, the approach is limited to investing large capital for building homes that are not guaranteed for longevity. The current approaches offer the end product to the community rather than a solution. There are limited examples that prove these methods as sustainable systems; therefore they fall in the category of aid and donations, ignoring the long term investment. There is a great need for an economic model that offers a system for building homes through technology and repeatable production. This will potentially lead to a cyclic economy that thrives from production and infrastructure construction, hence the sustainability feature. The logic of the connection between digital fabrication; design and the slum is in my opinion very simple, if frank Gehry can design and build a building as complex as the Guggenheim museum on time and on budget or if Shop architects have explored the advantages of digital tectonics and fabrication to produce a footbridge that can be assembled in six weeks on site, build a camera obscure using not mass produced parts but custom made parts, then custom made mass produced housing is not a mirage or dream but a possibility. Therefore, I think digital fabrication could solve the problem of housing a rising global population; however this is only in my pessimistic assumption. The idea being lowering the cost, of both construction and fabrication through digital fabrication, this would render good quality housing affordable. As well as maximizing the efficiency of both construction, planning and design. However, I think to answer the question one needs to divide it into components firstly being the brief understanding of the term digital fabrication, and then secondly answer the question how digital frication can lower costs and finally improve quality, speed of construction and overall efficiency. And also look at what these techniques have translated into at small scale housing projects in the first world.

Cost cutting and Increased efficiency: Case study: ShoP architects Gehry technologies and frank Gehry& Associates In which way has Gehry technologies improved costs analysis and at in what way has ShoP architects improved both cost effectiveness and efficiency In the p.h.d thesis entitled digital representation and the constructability of Gehry's architecture submitted to the department of architecture at M.I.T by the director at Gehry technologies, Dennis R. Sheldon. He explains the cons of using the technologies to control costs. "In architecture the design, engineering and construction costs are set up in sets, hard and soft costs. soft costs are the costs in design and engineering paid to the design team and what is called the hard costs paid to the contractor for labor and materials. It is assumed the hard costs are fixed, the reasoning being that the price of materials and labor can be relatively fixed, while the soft cost are relatively flexible. In theory costs for construction can be projected since a cubic meter of concrete is known for example, so the cost of a building of a certain size could be calculated from multiplying the cost per cubic meter of concrete by the cubic volume of the walls of the building and so on. However the costs in construction errors can cripple a project, a miss read dimension, for instance of timber beam or steel section can be discovered by the builders on site , resulting in more new material to be ordered. The delayed construction due to this reason can increase and accumulate, making the unit cost of a built much higher than estimated. However since the advent of digital design and fabrication there has been a shift in thought, putting design as the cost differentiator, since most clients thought the soft cost should be squeezed to curb costs. Digital design techniques have the potentials perhaps of cutting construction and material costs, the ability to plot and fabricate a building to some level of detail in digital space, can facilitate not only the analysis of cost of a building system but also increase the levels of dimensional accuracy; plot and plan the construction with greater accuracy. On the fabrication side, CNC (computer numerical controlled) machining, laser cutting and so facilitate grater tolerances, therefore increasing dimensional accuracy on site and overall quality first time". In schematic-phase design activities, where prototyping capabilities provide low-cost, highfidelity translations from digital to physical. However, such technologies are not yet scalable to building size objects of singular configuration, at unit costs competitive with that of traditional construction.

Swire Properties supported the development of a digitally integrated building delivery team for the One Island East Project (Hong Kong, 2004â&#x20AC;&#x201C;). The project database was used to produce detailed quantity extractions and cost estimates, which were provided to bidders as part of tendering phase documents. The â&#x20AC;&#x17E;single building modelâ&#x20AC;&#x; is, in fact, an integrated view of numerous trade- and disciplinespecific design documents.

Schematic design phase physical and digital structural studies

These techniques, taken into conventional projects provides powerful results as shown by the young practice in Shop architects, who have also joined in the ranks with other practices which have felt this wave of innovative use of computational tools. The New York based firm was called upon to Design a temporary pedestrian bridge and build it within 6 weeks, to connect parts of the city, which were destroyed the by the 9-11 attacks of the twin towers. The project came through on time and on budget. Shop is the next generation of digital design and fabrication; they are more pragmatic and technocratic in their approach, they have taken to heart Architect Norman foster's admonition cover to forget that the silent invisible electronic world of virtual design must ultimately end in physical reality. So their approach is to optimize the process of architecture, from design to construction. Innovative new ways of representation of a project have sprung up, this is true of the New York bridge. Shop presented their blueprints to the fabricators as DFX computer files , showing the pieces and their measurements to be cut and prefabricated before being shipped to the builder on site. At the other end the builder would receive a set of drawings in 3D showing how all the components go together similar to the way model aero-planes and toys are shown. This method again was used for the Mitchell Park Camera Obscura again in New York, which was entirely designed as a 3D computer model; digitally fabricated using CNC machines, and sent again to the builder as a kit of custom parts accompanied by a set of instructions for assembling the components. Every piece of wood, steel, and aluminum - 750 in total - is custom-made and completely unique. This shift in practice cannot be under-estimated. The representation techniques used by Shop present a fundamental shift, which has allowed costs to be put on the cap and the process of building fast and error free possible. on the other hand, In an interview with Wired magazine ShoP's principal Gregg Pasqualli agues that "Gehry uses these new technologies to make possible buildings so complex they previously existed only in the imagination. He is fundamentally interested in form, and his swooping shapes often force contractors to develop innovative construction techniques. That's partly why Gehry's work is so exciting - and so pricey". "Using today's tools, you could basically model any shape, press a button, print out the construction templates and say, 'Build this,'" says Craig Schwitter, of Buro Happold, an engineering firm that has collaborated with SHoP and Gehry. "That's the model of working that makes things expensive." Reed Kroloff, architectural critic; dean of the Tulane School of Architecture and former editor of Architecture magazine. says "Rather than using the computer to generate form, SHoP uses the computer to reconsider the entire process of building," I think, The economic advantage of using digital technology has been the driving force of both ShoP and Gehry, to put it bluntly the process slashes labor costs as the main building process has been reduced to an IKEA style furniture construction, the fabrication documents that support the contruction is encoded with dimensions, therefore this increases savings as cutting of materials is delegated to machines, which are error free. Although working at different economic scale Gerhry's contributions to this topic can not be sidelined, as his work around the world has factor that ShoP misses, which is the consideration of local economics.

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Architect William Massie

At a lower scale, both building type and cost, what is the discourse in digital fabrication in the 1st world. At lower economic scales digital fabrication is finding a following, research in low cost digitally fabricated housing is being under taken by a few architects and institutions, Massie Williams and Larry Sass are notably in the forefront of this discourse in the U.S.A. Dubbed as the Frank Gehry of prefab housing, by the architectural critic Reed Kroloff, the work of Architect Massie William is another example of this new generation of pragmatic approach to design-build process which is very much in the vain of SHoP. In what I would call â&#x20AC;&#x153;Budget Blingâ&#x20AC;&#x153;, Massie attempts to bring customised design to the cash strapped masses. In the book Blobitetucture by John K Waters architectural critic Reed Kroloff explains, because of the disparate goals and seemingly irreconcilable differences between the goals and concerns of architects and the manufacturer of building materials: you see, the building industry relies on standardisation to minimise costs. Architects, on the other hand tailor each project to the clients' needs. Customisation costs more then- off the shelf. A lot more. The result: architects design less than 10% of houses in America, leaving most people to live in cheaper, cookie cutter world suburbia. Massie is indeed close the actual construction of architecture than most architects at present, He has made some of the parts and components of his projects using his own digital laser cutting and milling machines, mainly to sculpt Styrofoam to create mould in which concrete would be poured into. He also cuts steel and other low cost materials to construct low costs dwellings. Although his targeted market in not as glamorous as Frank Gehry his goal if quite lofty- to create a new language of architectural practice and making, perhaps extending the democratic approach in architecture that modernism tried to pursue. In an interview with business week in 2002, Massie explains, "what I am trying to do is an extension of modernism (that goes back to ) it's true beginnings- when modernist homes were reasonably priced. If someone is thinking building a typical suburban house, I can do interesting modernist home instead for the same amount of money. People don have to pay a huge premium to live in a beautiful and some-what experimental space. The way light rakes across something curving is completely different from the way it strikes a flat wall".

How can Architects and designers intervene in slums with the aid of digital design and fabrication? The possibilities that the technology has shown with in William Massie work is very enticing, in the thought of adapting it to economical mass housing in the slum city. Other forms of digital technology have thrived in these places; the mobile phone and the P.C are examples. However what can be achieved in the USA using digital fabrication cannot be literally transferred to the mega slum, where people live on less than a dollar a day, and where the skills of an Architect or an Engineer cannot be afforded; besides the basic infrastructure and technology is not available. On the other hand, in a TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) lecture of 2005, Robert Neuwirth, author of Shadow Cities argues that the squatter city (kibera - Kenya, Soweto - south Africa, Rio de Janeiro - Brazil) in which today 1 billion people make their homes is a thriving site, in which people are ingenious and creative. Their houses are continuously improving organically, scavenging materials and components until a higher degree of quality is achieved, in some instances these buildings are multi-storey and use reinforced concrete in the case of Turkey and Brazil. The quality of the housing in these places is beyond the scope of the essay but provides and insight into the development of the places into higher quality housing that the western world enjoys. However, I think this suggests that digital fabrication could not solve the issue of slums but be part of the component that does. Technology isn't everything; this is perhaps shown by Frank Gehry and ShoP's projects. The intelligence is external to the machine, but they make dreams and designs possible. Gerhy's practice is involved in the manipulation of building systems, shuffling them with in a local economy and a creative use of digital fabrication to cut costs when conventional building techniques do not balance the set budget. In a TED talk lecture Neil Gershenfeld, agrees with my assumption saying "that the intelligence of these machines is external to the system therefore they are essentially computers that donâ&#x20AC;&#x;t control tools but are computers that should be defined as tools". By defining these systems as tools we can therefore layout solutions that will go along with digital fabrication tools to solve the problem of slums. However, the lessons learnt from ShoP architects and William Massie suggest that digital fabrication has the potential to aid the eradication of poor housing in the slum city, as it lowers the costs in both building and design and should never be dismissed; it also all allows mass customisation (which suits the building of housing that is aimed at the programs of the inhabitancy and the number of people in a family). The use of digital fabrication by ShoP and William Massie suggest that centralised and heavy construction tools can be bypassed by the use of digital fabrication, saving in labour time and empowering the owner. I think bulk of the solutions lay in social or organisational engineering being the management and distribution of these tools to solve local problems within local socio-economic parameters. I think the Fablabs are very important in doing that, the definition of the models of both aid and capital and the Intervention of designers through open source mediums, all these are component that are very important in solving the problem of poor hosing in the slums.

The Fablabs and open source intervention The issue of housing masses of people using this technology is an idea that has not been tried yet, but there are clues to how it may work through Project such as the FABLAB, directed and conceived by Neil Gershenfeld at the centre of bits and atoms at MIT. His idea was to establish these labs in many parts of the world from South Africa, Ghana and in the villages and cities of both the 1st and the 3rd worlds. The projects have been successful creating businesses and new products in the areas of industrial design. Using a bottom up approach, in which technology has been used to create the means to a better standard of living. The fablabs started as a course offered by his faculty at M.I.T, in how to make almost everything. In a TED Talk lecture Gershenfield expands, "most students involved had no technical skills" but showed in what Gershenfeild calls the "killer App" of personal fabrication. "The students were not using the machines to solve problems but to make themselves unique, creating personalised artefacts. the fablabs grew as an outreach project, in the third world - Ghana, south Africa for example the program gives away these tools, each lab is worth 20 thousand dollars. He explains "the first start is just empowerment the joy in these people of I can do it, it then goes to serious hand-on technical education informally out of schools, then these labs started doing serious problems solving, In rural northern Norway, a shepherd started a Fab Lab in order to build wireless tags for his sheep so he could keep track of them as they grazed, and eventually converted his lab into supplying wireless technology for his town, and then inventions for example low cost construction kits out of cardboard boxes". The research conducted by M.I.T professor of Architecture Larry Sass is perhaps another example into the development of economical housing using digital technology and such FabLab inventions. In South Africa Sass together with the FABLABS are investigating the possibility of creating designs and techniques that could be used to built new houses and upgrade old ones. The research project entitled instant house seeks to provide mass customized, designed housing to emergency and poverty stricken locations." A definitive need exists for a system that is rapidly deployable and scalable while fostering individuality within the larger rebuilt community. We aim to present a novel design and prefabrication process for mass customized emergency, transitional and developing contexts. The process aims to give agency to the end user, utilizing generative computational methods and Computer Numerically Controlled (CNC) fabrication techniques to accommodate for design customization in this previously monotonous genre. The Instant House product ships as an all inclusive flat packed structure, ready for immediate implementation. The end user can participate in this decision process, without incurring cost beyond the initial technological infrastructure. A generative system that mechanizes the interaction between user, designer and fabrication, attempts to effectively deploy customized dwellings without incurring a cost premium. Customized housing within these social contexts, is not intended as paradoxical, but acknowledges the personalization and customization already rife in South African slum communities from Levittown to Soweto. Initially the process utilizes the end user exclusively for assembly purposes, but taking a page from Gershenfeld's (2005) Fablab and given sufficient local resources, the Instant House system could ship as an autonomous factory, capitalizing on the availability of local labour, minimizing logistical costs and circumventing political lethargy while symbiotically paring with prevailing development concepts in microfinancing and marketing. â&#x20AC;? Says Professor Larry Sass and Marcel Botha in an MIT research paper entitled instant house. The full results of the research for the instant house, have not yet surfaced but sass has used these technologies to design and built new homes in Katrina truck New Orleans. Home delivery is again a research project aimed at developing design and construction of high quality, low energy and low cost Homes in New Orleans. The house's components would be manufactured onsite using digitally controlled laser cutting machines and assembled without nails or bolts, rather assembled like a huge 3d jigsaw puzzle.

Results The resulting artefacts from the system were a desktop model and full scale building assembled with a rubber mallet and crow bar only (Figure 7). Joint friction proved to offer sound solid connections between components to sustain assembly. A key function in the method was that internal studs were manufactured of many parts from standard sheets of plywood all were less than 6â&#x20AC;&#x; square, held together by friction only. Longer term research goals with houses to follow are improve assembly efficiency, reduce the number of components and assure waterproofing as part of the system generation. This project illustrates the possibility of manufacturing one room in approximately 6 days from conceptual modelling to full scale delivery. The resulting structure was tested for weathering for two calendar months with few signs of warping or disassembly. However, the structure will require a weatherproof skin.

A rough prototype from the construction model and a partially finished prototype from a corrected construction model.

3D construction model of every structural component to be cut by a digital fabrication device.

CNC wood router in Exmore Va. and loading a finished building component cut from a sheet of polyethylene onto a truck.

Digital mock-up of one section with OSB board and detail mock-up of micro tool paths.

First of 10 bundles of plywood cut in Virginia and assembly of contouring structure from the wall to the roof.

Resulting fully digitally fabricated exhibit structure with all components manufactured from plywood or plastic with two CNC machines.

However in my opinion the global housing problems, in both the 1st and 3rd world will not only rely on the inventiveness and skills of a few people but will rely on people using these fabrication techniques to solve local problems. I think digital media has shifted the way we organize our lives, for example if people in different parts of the world can collaborate in the writing of a encyclopedia as rich as the Britannica (wikipidia.com), therefore the population boom could possibly be not a bidden but a source of new and rich ideas that cumulate in cyberspace to solve problem at a local level. I see a future architect as a part of a mass collaborative effort to solve probably the hosing issue. And deploying digital fabrication technology to at a portal in which the he can export his/her output to a number of clients who are also collaborators. Hannes Meyer, once director of the Bauhaus once said "Architecture is a process of giving form to patterns to social life to community. Architecture is not an individual act performed by an artist-architect and charged with emotions. Building is a collective action". This means digital fabrication and CAD technology cannot be seen as the only aspect the will facilitate sustainable housing but also the participation of both the clients and skilled and creative Architects, Inventors and Engineers. A new wave of social and community creation has been established and explore by the FabLabs, as Gershenfeld explains during the TED lecture," The Fablabs are breaking boundaries and organisational structures, they are equipping people to create rather than consume, The message coming from the FabLabs is that the rest of the 5 billion people are not technical sinks but sources, harnessing the inventive power of the world to locally design solutions to local problems. I thought this was a projection into the future but it is happening now". A bottom up approach intertwined with collaboration between locals and designers is perhaps a model that would prove successful and sustainable, as a world development report, world bank 2004 suggests "the main difference between success and failure is the degree to which poor people themselves are involved in the quality and quantity of services they receive." Economist and philanthropist Jacqueline Novogratz has the same views, in her new book, The Blue Sweater, she tells stories from the new philanthropy, which emphasizes sustainable bottom-up solutions over traditional top-down aid. Acumen Fund a trust that she leads, manages more than $20 million in investments aimed at serving the poor. And most of their projects deliver stunning, inspiring results. Their success can be traced back to Novogratz herself, who possesses that rarest combination of business savvy and cultural sensitivity. In addition to seeking out sound business models, she places great importance on identifying solutions from within communities rather than imposing them from the outside. â&#x20AC;&#x153;People don't want handouts," Novogratz said at TED Global 2005. "They want to make their own decisions, to solve their own problems.â&#x20AC;? says ted.com commenting on her lecture entitled patient capitalism in 2007. Therefore I believe open source aid models like Architecture for Humanity, a web based organisation that seeks to develop designs for shelters and buildings, for impoverished and environmental disaster stricken communities, in collaboration with their clients. The website is headed by Architect, Cameron Sinclair, the author of design like you give a damn, is a tank of ideas that receives designs, drawings and illustrations of thousands of projects from a pool of designers globally. These projects and ideas are then sent to their sites were the community then decide to which they would want to build. "how do we solve problems of 5 billion people, with 10 million solutions" says Sinclair in a TED lecture of 2006. Funds to build the projects normally come from NGOs, governments and even from the designers themselves. I think the collaboration of FabLabs and Architecture for humanity would make a profound difference in the future.