BENV 2426 - Experimental Modelling

Poster Text -

Fractal Grove in the meaning of the name is essentially a cluster of different fractal elements, which fits together with what a grove is, being a cluster of trees. The proposal is for the site at the corner of cathedral street and crown street. The site brief was quite broad and asked for a way that nature could be incorporated within the design. From my initial studies in fractal geometry and incorporating nature into architecture I learnt how many modern buildings are deriving subtle hints of nature within their designs, one such example being the Burj Khalifa with its design based off a local native flower. Taking this premise I then looked at different ways to incorporate fractals within a design, ultimately choosing a tree as a basis for emanating fractals as their form has fractals hidden throughout the structure of a tree from the branches, root system, bark and leaf structure.

The site incorporates a central plaza with paths that lead towards the main portion of the building, along this path there will be different types of shops and a Theatre for different performances and concerts. The main purpose is to have a number of buildings that are separated and have different purposes but also have similarities in regards to the fractals that would be incorporated within the design. The location of the site is dependent on the neighbouring crown and cathedral streets. These roads are used as the main junction for exiting the city, so therefore in the proposed design the shops will be facing internally along the path to be a shield to the outside traffic and noise. With the exterior of the building emanating a shielding type facade it will exude a natural look in how it would resemble a row of trees that keeps the bustle of the city out. The interior paths will also incorporate trees that are shielded from the exterior facade.

The iterations shown above show the above structure of the leafs, each different iteration explores a different degree of scale for the structure and shows some variation that may appear when comparing two different leafs. The fractal nature of the leaf is quite evident as you can see how the pattern essentially scales down smaller as you reach the centre. The bottom facade shown below of the buildings iterations are based on differentiating clusters of trees if they were positioned in a row as well as exploring double layer of trees and gaps that would be used for shop openings. The fractal nature of the tree facade is subtle and unable to be seen from a front perspective, as the pattern can only be seen from above, from how the facade goes around the building.
The facade of the building uses the relationship of Koch snowflakes, they are one of the earliest forms of fractal curves and are dependent on the number three. Cantor set's are a set of points lying on a single line segment that are self similar because they are equal to two copies of itself, each copy is shrunk by a factor of 3. For this reason I have incorporated the three apartment\shop buildings so that they protrude from the main as to emanate the 1/3 relationship that is evident in the Koch and Cantor sets. This underlying feature represents how there are key mathematical elements that are predominant in fractals.