THESIS STATEMENT

Glass Architecture

The research addresses the process of desertification by utilising the desert’s onsite materiality and investigating its material contingency. The project focuses on the literal meaning of desertification, the physical spread of a desert over the living ecosystems, be it urban environment, rural vegetation or agricultural lands. The opportunity to bind particles by welding the sand surface was explored by attempting to replicate the emergence of fulgurites, glass formations created by lightning striking the desert surface.

By implementing models which force the material transformation of sand, the research is looking into the fusion of sand into the glass under high temperatures. The process has revealed an opportunity for applications of the strategy of the onsite fabrication of infrastructural formations which addresses the primary goal - the intervention to the physical spread of the desert. The glass structures augment the existing landscape and act as an obstacle against particle movements and will grow together with the dunes. Looking into the dynamics of dunes the aim is to slow down and redirect certain particles in a way to shape a new boundary of a desert.

Due to the harsh dynamic context and the big scale of implementation, the glass structures is to be constructed by a high population of agents, which agency let them be autonomous in decision making in a constantly changing environment, where solutions cannot be preplanned, thereby introducing another aspect of the project: the systematic organisation of the collective behaviour of agents.

The agents are programmed to be autonomous in the decision making of on-site fabrication, the trajectory of movement, and collaborative production. The network of movement is logistically simulated according to the local data and satellite imagine. This network is constantly changing with the movement of dunes and alterations to the landscape, creating a one-to-one dialogue between agents and the dynamic landscape.

Spreading toward the desert, structures would potentially leave a safe trace behind, giving the opportunity for the development of natural or urban fabric. Therefore, the strategy works not only as the prevention of desert spread but also as an amplification of life within the desert.