Holistic façade design integrating architectural, structural and environmental parameters

The inherent interdisciplinarity in the design of building envelopes gives the opportunity to correlate different aspects within the boundaries of a single subsystem. In fact, designers have to account for parameters and criteria that belong to diverse fields – such as architecture, building physics, structural design and construction technology – in the constant search for the most suitable trade-offs. A hierarchical approach, in which each aspect is considered separately is a logic answer to this complexity, however, it also fosters the idea that the overall process is just a simple sum of the single parts. Through a case study, the present work shows how technical and architectural requirements can be integrated from the early design stage and the advantages of addressing questions related to structural design, solar protection, and visual comfort simultaneously. By taking advantage of the combination of different computational digital tools, the case study focuses on the design of folded plate façade elements to retrofit an office building located in Zurich, Switzerland.