A Theory of Architectural Objects to support Design Configuration

Sammanfattning: The thesis presents the results from a research project targeting architectural design and house-building in a setting of industrialized design process and product platforms. During the early stages of a traditional design process, architects manage a degree of problem complexity, besides technical aspects, also includes user function, material, environment, aesthetics etc. As a result of the design process, various requirements will materialize within a framework of perceived user Situations in the realized building. Architectural design can thus be said to aim at prescribing such Situations based on the support given by various building systems. These Situations involve people, activities, experiences and the built environment, with desired compositional, functional and experiential properties, seen as a unit. In a theory building, it is claimed that a concept of Architectural Objects could make Situations explicit as design configuration objects in modular product platforms, and thus better support customization and architectural design in a configuration process. In a design configuration process, architectural objects combine compositional, user functional, technical functional and experiential properties within an aspectual systems view of the system man-building, here called the architectural view. The architectural view calls for architectural objects to be organized according to composition levels in order to handle design requirements on different organization levels in the built environment. The thesis presents a theoretical organization model for product platforms, supporting the object concept with levels. In three experimental case studies, the support for the concept is examined e.g.in the modularization of technical platforms, in support of design configuration and as a support for initial platform development. A presented extended organization model is also shown capable of linking architectural objects in the architectural view with representations of building elements in a parallel production view. The model was tested for design configuration in a BIM test environment on a customizable product platform with several design levels. The platform included a selection of multi-family house types, with the possibility to combine and alter according to both configuration and styling options on each level. The resulting production view featuring standard BIM compositional elements, seen as representations of production elements, is of particular interest for utilizing various BIM benefits, including analysis tools for design optimization, links to PDM systems and for supporting mass customization. It is argued that a concept with architectural objects can represent the structure of situations without regard for specific building systems, thus also supporting so-called Open Building platforms. This could enable architects and others to develop customizable product platforms more freely within the framework of BIM and also utilize the concept for supporting design configuration in a wider context of architectural design.