Performance Oriented Design

There emerges the need for a new social initiative which is not another function or specialization but is an integral of the sum of the product of all specialisations, that is, the Comprehensive Designer.

Fuller R. B. (2010 [1963]). Ideas and Integrities. Baden, Switzerland: Lars Müller Publishers. 230.

Dear friends and colleagues,

Over the last decade architectural discourse has become increasingly fragmented, focusing on stripped down and isolated discussions of form, geometry, material, computation, parametrics and so on, whatever the flavour of the day. New paradigms for architectural design have been posited rather frequently, which are based on such isolated themes. Clearly this does not make any sense. Moreover, from this arises the problematic that the profession is moving in a direction in which it becomes increasingly incapable of accomplishing the design synthesis that characterised it in the past and placed it in the centre of directing the collective development of the built environment.

Due to this development the question arises as to how an overarching discourse may be reconstructed. Here the attempt is made to deploy a rethought notion of ‘performance’ as a unifying concept for architectural discourse.

The concept ‘performance’ evolved out of a series of intellectual efforts that had broad consequences, bringing about a paradigm shift in the humanities referred to as the ‘performative turn’. These efforts commenced in the 1940s and 1950s and had significant impact also on the sciences, bringing about a ‘performative idiom’. (Pickering, 1995) With this the question arises as to what ‘performance’ in the context of architecture may be, contrasting previous attempts that focused predominantly on questions of representation and the meaning of buildings, and how performance might be reformulated as a driving concept for design that helps consolidating the artificial dichotomy between form and function into a synergetic relation with the dynamics of specific environments. Our approach to performance-oriented design considers four interrelated domains of 'active agency': the subject, the environment and the spatial and material organisation complex.'

Modulation of processes and promoting feedback between 4 domains of agency: subject, environment and the spatial and material organisation complex. © Michael Hensel, 2010

Within this discourse architecture and context are discussed as active agents that interact with environment and inhabitant. The dynamic that ensues from this facilitates a discourse that is based on interaction with significant ramifications for design, and, moreover, consequences for a more complex notion of sustainability of the built environment, investigating potent alternatives to todays dogmas and  clichés.

This website contains ongoing work in practice, research and education based on the notion of performance-oriented design and performance-oriented architecture. Our team provides expertise and consultancy in research, practice, and education.

Please note that the content of this website is not public domain material. The content is the intellectual property of the collaborating researchers who individually or jointly hold the copyrights for each respective research project or area.

This website is maintained and edited by Michael U. Hensel and Defne Sunguroğlu Hensel in collaboration with Prof. Dr. Birger R. Sevaldson.