Symposium

Smart Materials
Michelle Addington
Harvard University
http://www.gsd.harvard.edu/people/faculty/addington/

Summary
Rather than thinking of how we can deploy ‘smart materials’ within our current modes of practice, we need to invert our normal thinking about materials and technologies. Whereas architects tend to think of materials and technologies as ‘things’ – eg glazed curtain walls or indirect lighting – engineers think first about phenomena, in terms of properties or behaviours. Material choice follows rather than precedes the identified need, and a single need can be satisfied by a multitude of alternatives – a way of thinking that differs greatly from the architectural process, where choices are significantly limited. There are many reasons for the architect’s approach. Aesthetics aside, issues of cost, availability, labour skill, and maintenance all determine the choice of materials in the early stages of a design. Smart materials would of course generally fail to satisfy these concerns; they are higher cost, less readily available, and there is not enough knowledge or experience in the architectural community to effectively use and maintain them. But perhaps most difficult to address is that smart materials are part of an altogether different legacy of material development, coming from the family of micro-technologies and not construction technologies.

Biography

Michelle Addington is trained as both an architect and an engineer whose teaching and research explore the re-conceptualization of the human thermal environment. Originally educated as a nuclear and mechanical engineer, she began her career with NASA, and later worked in the chemical industry. After a decade in industry, she studied architecture, and joined a small Philadelphia firm as an associate. She subsequently earned a doctorate at Harvard to investigate emerging technologies. She joined the faculty of Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design in 1996, where she is an associate professor teaching courses in energy, environment, advanced technologies and new materials. She is co-author, with Daniel Schodek, of “Smart Materials and Technologies for the Architecture and Design Professions.”