Trailer Experiencing the transition

Not eligible for AIA CES Credits

Exploring transition spaces. Working between inside and outside, re-imagining relationships, re-thinking living spaces. Not just a door or a window. The topic of living, places of life, home and the office, the domestic environment and the work one.

The lesson explores the topic of the threshold, its physical construction, possibilities and forms, the relationship between man and the environment. Starting from the “threshold” means studying in depth one of the fundamental elements of architecture: the place representing the crossing point between inside/outside, public/private. The place where one can enter, to access a new space, where one can exit, towards a new landscape. The Latin “solum”, the two-dimensional surface of a floor or the earth that refers to the stone “one walks on”.  A limit that divides and separates while uniting. Changes and exchanges, new relationships that connect people, light, landscape, energy, sound and heat.

Entering and exiting. A constant movement, along an educational itinerary, that highlights comfort and well-being, research and innovation, material and technology, process and perception, dialogue and future. A lesson that crosses different narrative layers: technical, productive and operational.  Different spaces, from the laboratory through the workshop to the home. Changing boundaries, the threshold itself becomes space, endowed with three-dimensionality, placed “between things”. Fixtures as markers of the transition from one space to another. A connecting element, a place for domesticity, a factor of well-being and comfort for those who live there.

The common thread is the material used: aluminum, its evolution, characteristics and versatility take shape in its different possible applications: windows, doors and facades. 
A range of systems, renewable and recyclable, various finishes and installations, given exactly by the versatile material which they are made of. A ductile metal, fundamental for its lightness and resistance to oxidation, endowed with elastic properties, electrical and thermal conductivity, as well as a high weight/resistance ratio. 

A process, from concept to engineering, from prototyping to testing, production and marketing, standard and custom, applications and uses. Efficiency, comfort, technology, sustainability: all the parameters that define the measure of an environment, starting from the threshold spaces that organize its performance, working on the regulation and management of the different aspects.
Starting from a certain idea of well-being, of comfort, the lesson highlights concepts such as safety, innovation and quality: the design of architecture starting from one of its basic elements. Feeling good in a place implies safety, materials and beauty, a place and a project where sustainability is both a means and an end. A project in which sustainability is environmental and economic, as well as functional, looking to the future both in terms of maintenance and life cycle of products and in terms of innovation and research: the future.

An educational path that explores experience and expertise, research and continuous experimentation, always testing technological solutions, integrating them with contemporary innovations and proposing a complete project that works on the new issues of building automation.
The threshold becomes more than a simple physical element, a mere separation, but a bearer of ideas and values: dialogue and perception, a constant relationship between individuals and the environment, well-being. Building the future, starting from the concept of habitability, integrating home automation and aesthetics, always aiming at the combination of living comfort, form and environmental sustainability.

Learning objectives

• The lesson will explore the topic of the threshold as design subject through its structure, paying particular attention to the design and application solutions for profiles, frames, doors and facades in the definition and characterization of the transition between indoor and outdoor space;
• Different case studies, projects and creations will be presented, analyzing the formal and technological work on the threshold, in a synthesis between form and function. The importance of a responsible and sustainable design at all levels will be analyzed in depth, from the production of a single element to its installation, maintenance and life cycle within the architectural project;
  
• Starting from the technological element, the lesson will illustrate the phases and principles generating the concept and production of windows and doors and curtain walls, from concept to realization, from engineering to production, from prototyping to resistance tests, up to processing and finishing, considering technical characteristics, standards and performance parameters;
  
• Innovative experiments for facades and windows will be analyzed, which work in the interest of the well-being of the user who is in contact with them, explaining the parameters that need to be met and achieved in the design of spaces, considering visual, environmental, acoustic, thermal, light comfort and the safety of the space.