Blobitecture: Waveform Architecture and Digital Design

Product Review

The Apple iMac; the new VW Beetle; the Oh Chair; the Guggenheim Bilbao museum. These are all classic examples of blobism, a futuristic retelling of the curve, resulting in protoplasmic forms designed by computers. A growing number of inventive architects are now embracing this concept, making "blobitecture" the hottest global trend in the industry. This title focuses exclusively on the phenomenon in detail: how the process works; the geometrics and environmental challenges it presents; the sophisticated software that allows artists to bend the lines of traditional architecture and the stunning work produced by this art form. Featuring curved walls to blob-esque furniture to Greg Lynn's Embryological House and Koloatan and McDonald's Title House, this is both a showcase of the best in blobism, illustrated through computer-drawn renderings, illustrations and photographs, and a guide to applying it in a designer's own work.

Customer Reviews

Average Customer Review

(1 customer review)

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

Blob landscape survey, January 1, 2004

Jack Vaughan (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Blobitecture: Waveform Architecture and Digital Design (Hardcover)

This copiously illustrated survey posits architect Frank Gehry in an unfolding evolution of a phenomenon described as "Blob." The book, 'Blobitecture', shows the antecedents to Gehry, and parallel movements that have spawned such notable industrial designs as the Eames chairs and the Apple iMac.Form-follows-function was a stringent dictate on designers for many recent years. Advances in computers and computation [not to mention composite materials] have allowed Gehry to visualize designs that would not, on the face of it, seem to hold up, and come to up with the means to make these buildings - drooping, swooping, and so on - stand.Waters notes that this style arose as something of an anti-machine impulse, yet it could not have occurred without machine technology, specifically the computer technology that could provide underpinnings for 'improbably fluid forms.' The author uncovers some things that surprise. A Disneyland Monsanto house of the future [which could be a...Read more