Block and his team are looking for new structural forms and constructional systems that would allow materials to be used more efficiently. He takes inspiration from historical building principles, most of which have been replaced after the introduction of new building materials such as reinforced concrete and have thus been forgotten. Some of Block’s favourite examples include the vaults in Gothic cathedrals or Catalan vaults made from thin bricks.
Together with Co-Director Tom Van Mele, he uses computational methods to re-invent these building techniques of the past. With specially developed algorithms, the Block Research Group calculates how compression forces can be optimally distributed through a structure. This results in diverse shapes and systems, which often require no mortar or reinforcement and can bear heavy loads with little material. Block explains: “Also in the past expressive structures resulted from the need for economy. Efficiency doesn’t have to be boring.”
Block’s most famous works include the Armadillo vault for the Venice Architecture Biennale 2016, and the ultra-lightweight, unreinforced, rib-stiffened floor elements and sinuous concrete roof for the experimental HiLo building on the NEST platform.
An economical building standard
Block believes that architects and engineers have to use natural resources responsibly: “We can’t keep building as we are today, or we’ll run out of resources in the near future.” Standard reinforced concrete construction, for example, uses a lot of sand, and cement production generates a huge amount of CO
2
. Formwork material, especially for non-standard constructions, is often used just once and then discarded.
In Ethiopia’s Addis Ababa, Block and his team also worked on a house that was made primarily from local materials, was cheap to build and has a minimal carbon footprint. The house, known as the Sustainable Urban Dwelling Unit, was designed in collaboration with architect Dirk Hebel. Block’s team built the floor slab: a flat vault of thin bricks made entirely from Addis Ababa’s clay-rich earth and constructed by local workers.
