We recently partnered with the Aarhus School of Architecture in Denmark to explore and experiment with topology optimization for architectural applications, using the topology optimization capabilities of solidThinking Inspired as part of the student workshop. Led with the help of Andy Bartels, solidThinking’s program manager – advanced modeling tools, the workshop was a great success in highlighting to the school board and dean, as well as visiting guests from the urban planning department of Aarhus City administration, that the combination of robotic fabrication with hotwire cutting and topology optimization has a very strong architectural potential.

“The school board and City of Aarhus administration were really impressed that our students were able to grasp a process as complex as topology optimization within one day, and I must give full credit for this to the simplicity of the interface of solidThinking Inspired,” said Asbjørn Søndergaard, head of digital experimentation, Architect M.Arch., Aarhus School of Architecture. “The representatives of the city administration were so inspired by the results and potential that they offered us a prominent site for our prototype demonstration and public exhibition in downtown Aarhus held Oct. 16. The exhibition was a huge success and furthered our efforts to implement teaching in optimization, building on the positive experience from this workshop.”

We’d like to give many thanks to all of the participants, and especially to Asbjørn Søndergaard for the feedback and stunning photos and images from the workshop, which can be accessed by visiting our Facebook album, Aarhus – Inspired/Topology Optimization Workshop. We’ll be sure to share more from the upcoming exhibition in future articles.