Design & Technology Conference: ACADIA

Wow ... incredible is the word. I was inspired and motivated by the presentations that I saw at the ACADIA conference. And, I really love Chicago. It is the cleanest, big-city I know. I met some facinating people - so many of whom had ivy league educations. I was honored to meet and mingle with so many who had so many accomplishments. It was my first experience at a conference that had an academic focus rather than an emphasis on practice. I enjoyed the variety of theoretical precepts. Ask me sometime about fritting. I saw some amazingly simple actions that could create movement in designed surfaces. Multiple layers of glass, perforated metal, or plexi appliqued with felt dots could be rotated to form rhythmicly changing patterns and levels of transparency. Really beautiful use of technology. Other technologies use sensors and actuators that allow architectural elements to respond to human activity. I was already somewhat familiar with smart textiles - clothing that can record vital sign data and report information back to a physician. Next, architecture could do something similar and respond to climactic data and evolve to become self-controlled like a mega-thermostat. The possibilites make my head hurt.