Applying Performative Materials in Architectural Envelope

Abstract

Architectural Envelope has a very important role as a protective wrapper between the inside and outside, so it is responsible for energy optimization and environmental protection. Therefore, using performative/adaptive materials in envelopes becomes necessary for saving energy, cost and minimizing the complicated hard mechanical system and by replacing it with the material system. This thesis aims to assess several performative materials integrated with the suitable adaptive structure to have the most effective and applicable performative architectural envelope. The assessment is based on a comparative analysis of Performative Materials (PM) properties and integrating adaptive structures through a multi-disciplinary literature review. This thesis sets a comprehensive classification for PMs evolution, performance properties of PMs and also evolution of adaptive structures. PMs divided into four eras different in its combination and techniques used in it, which are 1) natural and bio-inspired materials, 2) smart materials, 3) composite materials and 4) programmable materials. Results show the main properties that must be in an architectural envelope and the most common achieved properties. The thesis provides further insights to investigate a multidisciplinary research on advances of programmable materials and its use in an architectural envelope.