We’ve covered many advantages of data-driven design in previous posts. Thinking data first has many advantages along the project’s life cycle that raise efficiency by saving time and resources, improving accuracy, facilitating daily workflows, and simplifying what it means to build.
Parametric Design: Tying Intent to Response
This is where parametric design comes in. The idea has been around for more than a century: it’s a paradigm shift in thinking and designing not just a piece of software or technology. By using rules to evaluate the design and the relationship between the elements, the outcome is manipulated. These rules are parameters input with the design evaluation tool of your preference — whether they be analog models or software tools. These parameters alter the result of a given equation or system to achieve design goals and compare them to a set of constraints.
Although we mentioned parametric design is not directly related to a specific piece of technology, software can help turn these ideas into practice. Software tools can bring the full power of parameter-driven practices to our reach. By optimizing our designs through these practices, we can make them respond better to constraints like gravity, resource, and waste management. But also, bring a lot of the complexity found in nature to our own artificial built world.
Implementing BIM workflows can help the transition to parametric-driven design paradigms, as doing so ensures that we already have an intelligent 3D model with not only accurate geometry but also reliable data that can make our designs a lot richer if wisely used. Digital strategy meeting construction. Intent meet Design.