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Philippe Samyn deplores the lack of new ideas
coming out of architects’ offices these days:
‘someone draws shapes and it is up to some poor
engineer to make them stand up; beautiful scale
models are created that send chills up the spine.
Today, 3d software allows people to trace any sort
of shape they wish, but this is not a reason to do
any old thing!’
During the design of the Aula Magna, Marcel Crochet,
the rector of ucl, remarked, ‘one technology replaces
another, and I do not want the Aula Magna to be
dependent on a technology’. Philippe Samyn also
favours an architecture in which even the essence is
not dependent on technology, but he hastens to add,
‘only art can bear witness to an old technology’. Having
experienced the arrival and development of computer
technology, he looks at it with a somewhat critical gaze
and uses it for what it is, taking care not to become a
slave to it, nor to fall prey to its limitations as a tool. He
first used computers to calculate structures. Starting in
1979, he used them to create specifications and bills of
quantities, and then progressively experimented with
them for drafting. In 1985, he acquired the equipment
needed to print out two-dimensional drawings that
were more exact than those done by hand. Later, as
the appropriate hardware and software developed, he
moved gradually into 3d . The first project in which the
computer proved to be indispensable was the forestry
centre at Marche-en-Famenne (01-279), where a
programme was used to create production drawings
for the metal shoes needed to connect the parts of the
spherical dome’s wooden framework. During the study
of an outbuilding of the Château de Seneffe in 1996
(01-341), an intern, who was drawing a stairway in 3d ,
demonstrated the potential of an application, which the
The role of computers
in architecture
office immediately acquired. This type of programme is
very useful for automatically visualising the secondary
parts of a project, but 3d graphics have not replaced
models, which remain essential to the fundamental
activity of the architect. Above all, computers allow
everyone in the team to be operational, and to work
on the same object simultaneously. Such a collective
effort is much more successful, even if it involves a
slight drop in quality. In addition, e-mail allows informa-
tion to be structured: each e-mail message is seen by
at least two people (including Philippe Samyn or one
of his partners; a drawing is seen by at least three
people, including Samyn). Without this discipline, it
is impossible to maintain the unity and coherence of
current projects. The creation of models is becoming
automated. From computer numerical control (cnc) for
cutting out pieces, we have moved to stereolithography
– three laser beams converge on a vat of polymer resin
and build the model point by point. Computers have
brought astonishing progress to the competitiveness
of metallic frameworks. Before 1989, they were little
used, but the arrival of machine tools and calculation
applications that are within the reach of any design
office has meant that metal frames have taken off.
Today, using the Xsteel modelling software, there is
nothing to keep an architect – providing that he or she
works with a trained engineer – from supplying files
that can be used directly for tracing, without having to
go through an office specialised in metal frameworks to
convert them.
Just as one needs to read and reread on paper what
one has typed on a computer, the physical model
shows its usefulness during the architectural design
phase of a project and above all at the engineering
stage. Similar analogies can be found in other domains,
such as fluid mechanics, where it is often necessary
to use testing to confirm calculations made by applica-
tions such as Fluent.