Murmuration Inspired Form Finding
Photo credit Felix Mallinder
Author Felix Mallinder
The task is a shelter design, with the chosen context of wilderness and a hide, for the observation of life in a natural environment. This project aims to embody the context in both the design artefact and design process.
The purpose of a hide is to provide a structure which embodies the environment and disguises the user, to allow observation and connection to nature. Although the humanistic design is inherently unnatural, this design looks to learn from that which it observes, to provide a morphology better suited to the environment. Hence, reducing situational contention between object and observer and enriching the connection to nature through architectural design.
The focal point from which the form logic will be derived is that of bird murmurations and more specifically starlings. The murmuration of starlings provides a unique look at natural form building, they exist as hundreds of self-sentient pieces which collectively congregate, developing an incidental form. This unintentional design is what makes the morphology of murmuration truly natural, and far from humanistic architectural choices. The movement and formation of the starlings can be mapped through a simplistic set of logics, which collectively can result in a unique form-finding process, embodying an architectural innocence and purity.
This project aims to abstract that, not to mimic the form but the action, to develop a workflow and artefact that bares the fruits of this natural form-finding method. Hence, producing a design of which is outwith the right-angled, methodical, symmetrical morphologies which imbue standardised shelter design.
