View source for Digital architecture

{{Short description|Architecture using digital technology}}
{{About|digital architecture in the built-environment sense|IT infrastructure|Digital architect}}
[[File:High quality 3d rendering service. Praxis Studio.jpg|alt=A realistic digitally rendered building|thumb|322x322px|An example of a building created using architecture software]]

'''Digital architecture''' refers to aspects of architecture that feature [[Digital data|digital]] technologies or considers digital platforms as online spaces. The emerging field of digital architectures therefore applies to both classic architecture as well as the emerging study of social media technologies.

Within classic architectural studies, the terminology is used to apply to digital skins that can be streamed images and have their appearance altered. A headquarters building design for Boston television and radio station [[WGBH-TV|WGBH]] by [[Polshek Partnership]] has been discussed as an example of digital architecture and includes a digital skin.<ref name="digital skin">{{Cite web |title=WGBH to wrap new headquarters in digital skin |url=http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2004/02/01/wgbh_looks_to_wrap_new_headquarters_in_digital_skin/ |last=Campbell |first=Robert |date=2004-02-01 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040208150214/http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2004/02/01/wgbh_looks_to_wrap_new_headquarters_in_digital_skin/ |archive-date=2004-02-08 |website=[[The Boston Globe]]}}</ref>

Within social media research, digital architecture refers to the technical protocols that enable, constrain, and shape user behavior in a virtual space.<ref name="bossetta-01">{{cite journal|last=Bossetta|first=Michael|title=The Digital Architectures of Social Media: Comparing Political Campaigning on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat in the 2016 U.S. Election|journal=Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly|date=2018|volume=95|issue=2|pages=471–496|doi=10.1177/1077699018763307|doi-access=free|arxiv=1904.07333}}</ref> Features of social media platforms such as how they facilitate user connections, enable functionality, and generate data are considered key properties that distinguish one digital architecture from another.

==Overview==
[[Architecture]] created digitally might not involve the use of actual materials (brick, stone, glass, steel, wood).<ref name="digital"/> It relies on "sets of numbers stored in [[Electromagnetism|electromagnetic]] format" used to create representations and simulations that correspond to material performance and to [[map]] out built artifacts.<ref name="digital">Daniela Bertol, David Foell [https://books.google.com/books?id=X8gK2FaiYvsC&dq=%22Digital+Architecture%22&pg=PA57 Designing digital space] page 57</ref> It thus can involve [[digital twin]]ning for planned construction or for maintenance management. Digital architecture does not just represent "ideated space"; it also creates places for human interaction that do not resemble physical architectural spaces.<ref name="digital"/> Examples of these places in the "Internet Universe" and [[cyberspace]] include [[website]]s, [[multi-user dungeon]]s, [[MOO]]s, and [[web chatroom]]s.<ref name="digital"/>

Digital architecture allows complex calculations that delimit architects and allow a diverse range of complex forms to be created with great ease using computer [[algorithm]]s.<ref name="digital architecture and construction">A. Ali, C. A. Brebbia [https://books.google.com/books?id=8NIxLRQyLNAC&q=digital+architecture&pg=PT63 Digital architecture and construction] Abstract by S. Hatzellis, University of Technology, Sydney Australia page 51, 54</ref> The new genre of "scripted, iterative, and indexical architecture" produces a proliferation of formal outcomes, leaving the designer the role of selection and increasing the  possibilities in architectural design.<ref name="digital architecture and construction"/> This has "re-initiated a debate regarding curvilinearity, expressionism and role of technology in society" leading to new forms of non-standard architecture by architects such as [[Zaha Hadid]], [[Kas Oosterhuis]] and [[UN Studio]].<ref name="digital architecture and construction"/> A conference held in London in 2009 named "Digital Architecture London" introduced the latest development in digital design practice.

The [[Far Eastern International Digital Design Award]] (The Feidad Award) has been in existence since 2000 and honours "innovative design created with the aid of digital media." In 2005 a jury with members including a representative from [[Quantum Film]], [[Greg Lynn]] from [[Greg Lynn FORM]], Jacob van Rijs of [[MVRDV]], [[Gerhard Schmitt]], [[Birger Sevaldson]] (Ocean North), chose among submissions "exploring digital concepts such as computing, information, electronic media, hyper-, virtual-, and cyberspace in order to help define and discuss future space and architecture in the digital age."<ref>Yu-Tung Liu [http://architettura.supereva.com/extended/20060513/index.htm The Philosophy of Digital Architecture: The FEIDAD Award] Architettura</ref>

==Social media==

The concept of digital architectures has a long history in Internet scholarship. Prior to [[social media]], scholars focused on how the structure of an online space – such as a forum, website, or blog – shaped the formation of publics and political discourses.<ref name="jones-rafaeli-01">{{cite journal|last1=Jones|first1=Quentin|last2=Rafaeli|first2=Sheizaf|title=Time to Split, Virtually: 'Discourse Architecture' and 'Community Building' Create Vibrant Virtual Publics|journal=Electronic Markets|date=2010|volume=10|issue=4|pages=242–282|doi=10.1080/101967800750050326}}</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia|last1=Sack|first1=Warren|title=Discourse Architecture and Very Large-scale Conversation|encyclopedia=Digital Frontiers: IT and New Architectures in the Global Realm|editor1=Robert Latham|editor2=Saskia Sassen|year=2005|pages=233–253|url=https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9781400831616.242/html|doi=10.1515/9781400831616.242|isbn=978-1-4008-3161-6 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> With the rapid rise of social media, scholars have turned their attention to how the architectural design of social media platforms affects the behavior of influential users, such as [[political campaigns]].<ref name="bossetta-02">{{cite journal|last=Bossetta|first=Michael|title=The Digital Architectures of Social Media: Comparing Political Campaigning on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat in the 2016 U.S. Election|journal=Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly|date=2018|volume=95|issue=2|pages=471–496|doi=10.1177/1077699018763307|doi-access=free|arxiv=1904.07333}}</ref> This line of research differs from the [[affordances]] approach,<ref name="bucher-helmond-01">{{cite encyclopedia|last1=Bucher|first1=Taina|last2=Helmond|first2=Bucher|title=The Affordances of Social Media|encyclopedia=The SAGE Handbook of Social Media|editor1=Jean Burgess|editor2=Alice Marwick|editor3=Thomas Poell|year=2017|pages=233–253|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/317792421}}</ref> which focuses on the relationships between users and technology, rather than the digital architecture of the platform.

==See also==
* {{annotated link|Architectural theory}}
* {{annotated link|Affordance}}
* {{annotated link|Building information modeling}}
** {{annotated link|List of BIM software}}
* {{annotated link|Blobitecture}}
* {{annotated link|Design computing}}
* {{annotated link|Digital architect}}
* {{annotated link|Digital art}}
* {{annotated link|Digital twin}}
* {{annotated link|Computer cartography}}
* {{annotated link|Digital morphogenesis}}
* {{annotated link|Information Age}}
* {{annotated link|Interactive architecture}}
* {{annotated link|Social media}}
* {{annotated link|Virtual reality}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

== Further reading ==

===General===
* Hovestadt, Ludger; Urs Hirschberg; Oliver Fritz (Eds.) (2020): ''Atlas of Digital Architecture: Terminology, Concepts, Methods, Tools, Examples, Phenomena.'' Basel/Berlin/Boston: Birkhäuser Verlag, {{ISBN|978-3-0356-1989-8}}.
* [[Rivka Oxman|Oxman, Rivka]] and Oxman Robert [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ad.1101/abstract 'Architectural Design - The New Structuralism: Design, Engineering and Architectural Technologies'] Wiley, 2010. {{ISBN|978-0-470-74227-3}}.
* Lynn, Greg. Animate Form. Princeton Architectural Press, 1998. {{ISBN|1568980833}}.

===Education===
* Andia, Alfredo (2002). [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1162/10464880260472512/abstract;jsessionid=58DF7D1D8051DA6166CA3E434EA80220.d04t02?systemMessage=Wiley+Online+Library+will+be+disrupted+on+9+June+from+10%3A00-12%3A00+BST+%2805%3A00-07%3A00+EDT%29+for+essential+maintenance&userIsAuthenticated=false&deniedAccessCustomisedMessage= 'Reconstructing the Effects of Computers on Practice and Education during the Past Three Decades'], Journal of Architectural Education, 56, 2, pp.&nbsp;7–13

==External links==

===Knowledge repositories===
* [http://cumincad.scix.net/cgi-bin/works/Home Cumulative Index of Computer Aided Architectural Design (CUMINCAD)]

===Academic journals===

====Primary====
* [http://www.multi-science.co.uk/ijac.htm International Journal of Architectural Computing]

====Relevant====
* [http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/ndcr Digital Creativity]
* [http://www.nexusjournal.com/ Nexus Network Journal]

===Associations and organizations===
* [http://www.caadria.org/ Association for Computer-Aided Architectural Design Research in Asia (CAADRIA)]
* [http://www.acadia.org/ Association for Computer-Aided Design in Architecture (ACADIA)]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20080514201800/http://www.caadfutures.org/ CAADFutures Foundation]
* [http://www.ecaade.org/ Education and research in Computer Aided Architectural Design in Europe (eCAADe)]
* [http://www.sigradi.org/ The Iberoamerican Society of Digital Graphics (SIGraDi)]

{{Digital art}}

[[Category:Architectural design]]