SoomeenHahm Design, Igor Pantic and Fologram have built a twisting pavilion for the 2019 Tallinn Architecture Biennial using augmented reality and old-fashioned woodworking.
Fologram provides architects with applications that use Microsoft HoloLens, while SoomeenHahm Design is a London-based design studio founded by Soomeen Hahm and Igor Pantic is a teaching fellow at the Bartlett.

The design team combined traditional methods such as steam-bent hardwood and hand tools with the latest technology to create the timber and steel structure, which is called Steampunk.
Their aim was to find a method that combined technology in a way that still kept the designers close to the craft of building, rather than using robots to build the pavilion.

"Computer aided manufacturing and robotics have given architects unprecedented control over the materialisation of their designs," said the design team. "But the nuance and subtlety commonly found in traditional craft practices is absent from the artefacts of robotic production."

Instead of line drawings as construction guides, Steampunk was made using digital models that were projected in augmented reality. These were used as guides for the build team who set to work using traditional tools.
This experimental approach meant they were free to adapt the structure on the spot in response to their materials.

Rather than pre-cut pieces of wood, Steampunk is built from metre-square boards that were bent using steam. Steam-ben...