If we understand architecture as a three-part system formed by the building, its image, or drawings and images describing buildings, and the critical discourse around architecture, then the texts or ways of speaking about architecture play a key role in understanding the field and its development. By analysing a corpus of around 4.6 million words from texts written between 2005 and 2020 that form a part of critical discourse in computational architecture (understood as the result of the intense digitalization of the field), this paper aims to map ways of speaking about computational architecture. This contributes to architectural theory and might help gain a better understanding of the evolution of the digitalization of construction in general. Findings show that computational architecture is surrounded by a specific way of speaking, hybridized with words from fields such as biology, neuroscience, arts and humanities, and engineering. While some topics such as ‘sustainability’ or ‘biology’ come up consistently in the discourse, others, such as ‘people’ or ‘human’, have periods when they are more and less popular. After highlighting open research questions, the paper concludes by presenting a map of periodic and recurring topics in ways of speaking about computational architecture over the last 15 years, thus tracking and documenting long-term trends, and illuminating patterns in the broader field of digital construction.

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This paper presents a design framework for the design and production of a sculptural installation which combines sound experimentation with 3D modelling and digital fabrication. This paper's aim is to make a two-fold contribution. On one hand, it describes the design framework as a support tool for practitioners in their exploration of sound-informed geometries through 3D modelling and digital fabrication. On the other hand, it informs educators on key aspects for combining sound, 3D modelling, and digital fabrication within educational curricula and in their students' design processes. The framework was tested during a workshop where participants produced and fabricated 3D objects informed by sound patterns they created. After describing the design process, the final installation and its shape grammars, as well as participant experiences during the design process, the paper concludes with a discussion on how the design framework can be useful for practitioners and educators. CCS Concepts: • Human-centered computing → Visualization; • Applied computing → Sound and music computing; • Computing methodologies → Shape modeling.

The process of architectural design aims at solving complex problems that have loosely defined formulations, no explicit basis for terminating the problem-solving activity, and where no ideal solution can be achieved. This means that design problems, as wicked problems, sit in a space between incompleteness and precision. Applying digital tools in general and artificial intelligence in particular to design problems will then mediate solution spaces between incompleteness and precision. In this paper, we present a study where we employed machine learning algorithms to generate conceptual architectural forms for site-specific regulations. We created an annotated dataset of single-family homes and used it to train a 3D Generative Adversarial Network that generated annotated point clouds complying with site constraints. Then, we presented the framework to 23 practitioners of architecture in an attempt to understand whether this framework could be a useful tool for early-stage design. We make a three-fold contribution: First, we share an annotated dataset of architecturally relevant 3D point clouds of single-family homes. Next, we present and share the code for a framework and the results from training the 3D generative neural network. Finally, we discuss machine learning and creative work, including how practitioners feel about the emergence of these tools as mediators between incompleteness and precision in architectural design.

Bringing Human-Centredness to Technologies for Buildings: An agenda for linking new types of data to the challenge of sustainability. In A.