ABSTRACT
At the beginning of the twenty-rst century, following the death of the “single surface” project in digital design, a sudden interest in tectonic discretization and componentry emerged. To some degree, this development can be attributed to the rst generation of digital designers beginning to tire of virtual continuity in the form of endless blank surfaces, moving toward ne-grained surface articulation driven by material limits and available production methods. Since then, a huge amount of work has been undertaken in this area, with issues ranging from buildability and cost-eectiveness, to the aesthetic implications of CNC tooling, to the use of parametrics
to generate variable panelization across surfaces. Parametric discretization, in particular, has taken the discipline by storm, with its seductive implications of being an art form conveniently couched in an economic model – a perfect match of beauty and optimization. e problem is, parametric work tends to be immediately identiable and therefore consumable. It is identiable through its indexicality to the algorithms that drive it as much as to the industrial methods of production that underwrite it. More compelling, perhaps, is the competing sensibility of a new generation of architects focused on surface features which exceed such limitations towards the transformative and the mysterious. is sensibility avoids the aesthetic and conceptual limitations of linear parametric gradients, recognizing that surface discretization as it relates to the expression of material limits is expedient but ultimately passé. A perfect example is the recent advent of “meta-seaming,” or the articulation of seams as ornament, driven by aect, rather than as a one-dimensional index of the beginnings and ends of pieces of material. Meta-seaming puts form and material into a more complex relation; once a joint or seam is released from indexicality, it is free to obfuscate or enhance formal, ornamental, or even infrastructural features within surfaces. Meta-seaming logic can begin to break down the lock-step of seams and sub-structure into articulations in surfaces which can begin to do unexpected kinds of work in unexpected patterns. Meta-seams, like tribal tattoos, can shi between emphasizing underlying bone structure or musculature and expressing completely independent painterly eects.1
