Parametric design is a theme under much discussion within every design practice, as more designers and international firms are adopting this approach to design their projects in an associative way. As part of the Digital Tectonics Program in IaaC, we were assigned the project of creating a house parametrically using Top Solid, a software mainly applied for mechanical engineering projects. Our group, Luis Fernando Odiaga and  Francisca Aroso and me, in a left-over space we appropiated and named La Suite, ventured to learn and experiment with parametric and associative design. We wanted to develop a house that would be moulded from existing parameters of a site (sun, wind) a method which enabled us understand the house as a habitable void very much related to the site and its conditions.  We “sculpted” the house out of the site.

Our approach was to relate the house and the site by using supporting legs that allow a cave-like ground level functioning as the vertical circulation between interior, exterior and site. To ensure this, a point within the splines that generate the cavernous surface is always attached to some point within the splines that generate the site’s surface.  The house is a cube that is intervened by 3 surfaces (which generate the roof, the ground level and the site) through a series of associative boolean operations.

This means that wherever the house is located, it can be easily adaptable to any site condition and can also be adjusted to other considerations such as budget, visual access, privacy and so on, creating a similar yet uniquely creative solution to every house. The advantages of this type of design approach are numerous. The designer can quantize how much material is needed, and therefore how much it will cost, to construct projects; The centuries-old existing gap between design and construction may very well be bridged through digital tectonics. For instance, parametric software outputs updatable precise construction drawings, ready to be sent into CNC milling or laser-cutting fabrication processes. There is a heightened sense of form-finding through the inherent associative thinking that affect the way we understand design and build projects at any scale. Form ‘emerges’ as a logical or sometimes chaotic healthy feedback-loop between different parameters, components, surfaces and structures, much like biological organisms evolve.

This research led me to explore how to apply this approach in other scales of design. My master’s final project addressed the topic of how or when we should fix a variable, evolutionary process. Using the same logic, I created a series of houses which are essentially the same model, but each one is unique in its form, size and location. Using Top Solid again, I managed to create a cluster of 10 houses in a mangrove-covered, fisher-town named La Parguera, located in the southwest region of Puerto Rico. The aim was to create a neighborhood of houses which are related by either proximity or shape, but each one located in a “democratic” way to ensure that everyone would have privacy and a specific view of the Caribbean Sea without interrupting the others.

This is IaaC’s last party of the 2007-2008 academic year, after an exhausting year of hard work, intense pressure, highs and lows, and of course molte cava… Iwas held on June 29, a day after the final thesis presentations in the outskirts of Barcelona in an area called Can Valldaura, a countryhouse that is part of the IaaC now.

Instantes Infinitos (infinite instants) addresses the issue of visual manipulation to create a paradox, in this case the infinity through finite materials. In a deeper sense, one can think about the illusion of eternity, spatially as well as temporally, which has been so much sought after since ancient times. Nonetheless it´s still an artifice, a three-dimensional construction of an almost unreachable truth. But, which truth? for it is a concept that lies in the eye of the beholder, or his/her heart and brain. As we know, History is always written by the conquerors. However, history comes from his story, so instead of a single, absolute truth, there are multiple truths unfolding in space and time. Politics and religion rely on such concepts of illusion and eternity to keep manipulating masses and prevent them from reaching higher levels of intelligence and self-organization. Since their beginnings, major religions have encouraged fanatism and as a result, they have committed some of the worst atrocious acts on humanity in the name of their truth: God. President-elect Obama’s campaign success is based upon the illusion of change. Only time will tell.

The project is part of an annual grant by Lexus to three emerging artists that have the chance to propose, design and exhibit a 1-year project , with an exhibition being held at the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico. On November 21, 2008 this exhibition opened to the public and received coverage in national press and television, which is a great exposure and opportunity for artists, who are always complaining about the lack of spaces and/or money to develop non-commercial projects.

The title itself is a paradox, since I like to play with words and meanings to provoke, since I prefer the spectator to make a reflection rather than contemplate it just aesthetically. The ladder transforms itself into a window which opens to a sea of endless possibilities and interpretations the spectators can imagine of. The next image is the file that was sent to cut the pieces in a CNC milling machine. Because the ladder is 11 feet tall, it had to be done in sections, one with the acrylic sheet’s maximum height (8 feet, center) and other with the remaining 3 feet (left). The one in the right is the top and bottom mirrors, which have two openings each to fix the ladder within them.