The Making of the Sequential Roof, ARCH_TEC_LAB, ETH Zurich
Aleksandra
Anna Apolinarska, Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich
The Arch_Tec_Lab of the Institute of
Technology in Architecture (ITA), ETH Zurich, is covered with a novel timber roof structure, developed and planned at the
Chair of Architecture and Digital Fabrication (Gramazio Kohler Research).
The 2,308 m2 free-form
roof structure consists of 168 trusses assembled robotically from nearly 50,000 unique timber elements in a fully automated
process. The complex geometry required a digital planning process that combined design, structural analysis and fabrication
details into an integrated computational workflow.
Aleksandra Anna Apolinarska of Gramazio Kohler Research
at ETH Zürich was responsible for the project during the specialist design and construction phase. She is an architect with
a passion for geometrically complex shapes, computer-aided design and digital fabrication. She gained her professional experience
in renowned offices across Europe, including Foster+Partners, designtoproduction, LAVA and UNStudio. By example of the “Sequential
Roof” she will explain how innovative computational design and manufacturing methods not only change the logistics of timber
construction but also lead to novel architectural solutions.
