3D Design Inspiration: Operative Design – A Catalog of Spatial Verbs by Anthony di Mari and Nora Yoo #3DThursday #3DPrinting

415BI3XGshL

I have lately been collecting art, architecture, and design books that offer shape, decoration, design, and assembly ideas pertinent to 3D design and 3D printing. I’d like to share a few of these during #3dthursday each week, as those attending Ask An Engineer on Saturday nights have been requesting this.

First off, here is a fascinating architecture book that examines the “spatial verbs” at the heart of designing “space.” For example: extruding, scaling operations, and combining two shapes. While this isn’t precisely a list of operations used in a CAD program — these concepts are abstracted from the processes typically used to perform these “spatial verbs” — I have found thumbing through the scaffolding logic of this book deeply inspiring: the book begins stacking simple operations to generate more and more complex shapes and assemblies as it goes. Really helpful when I am looking for ideas to develop a simple design project into something more pleasing and more successful compositionally speaking.

Thanks to Jesse Spielman for introducing me to this book. He had said: “I don’t know why people aren’t really excited when they see this book — your reaction is what I expected.” Well, I suspect that readers here are also in the same camp.

From the publisher’s site:

This is a new title in the Architecture and Design Experiments series. The core idea for this book is the use of operative verbs as tools for designing space. These operative verbs abstract the idea of spatial formation to its most basic terms, allowing for an objective approach to create the foundation for subjective spatial design. Examples of these verbs are expand, inflate, nest, wist, lift, embed, merge and many more. Together they form a visual dictionary decoding the syntax of spatial verbs. The verbs are illustrated with three-dimensional diagrams and pictures of designs which show the verbs ‘in action’.

This approach was devised, tested, and applied to architectural studio instruction by Anthony Di Mari and Nora Yoo while teaching at Harvard University’s Career Discovery Program in Architecture in 2010. As instructors and as recent graduates, they saw a need for this kind of catalogue from both sides – as a reference manual applicable to design students in all stages of their studies, as well as a teaching tool for instructors to help students understand the strong spatial potential of abstract operations.

Anthony Di Mari is adjunct professor at Northeastern University’s School of Architecture and Nora Yoo is a practicing architect at Architecture Research Office in NYC.

  • Visual dictionary of spatial verbs
  • Devised, tested and applied at Harvard University
  • Useful for architecture and design students and teachers

Read more.

229 bookpage operative design 2


Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards

Join Adafruit on Mastodon

Adafruit is on Mastodon, join in! adafruit.com/mastodon

Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.

Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.

Join us every Wednesday night at 8pm ET for Ask an Engineer!

Join over 36,000+ makers on Adafruit’s Discord channels and be part of the community! http://adafru.it/discord

CircuitPython – The easiest way to program microcontrollers – CircuitPython.org


Maker Business — “Packaging” chips in the US

Wearables — Enclosures help fight body humidity in costumes

Electronics — Transformers: More than meets the eye!

Python for Microcontrollers — Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: Silicon Labs introduces CircuitPython support, and more! #CircuitPython #Python #micropython @ThePSF @Raspberry_Pi

Adafruit IoT Monthly — Guardian Robot, Weather-wise Umbrella Stand, and more!

Microsoft MakeCode — MakeCode Thank You!

EYE on NPI — Maxim’s Himalaya uSLIC Step-Down Power Module #EyeOnNPI @maximintegrated @digikey

New Products – Adafruit Industries – Makers, hackers, artists, designers and engineers! — #NewProds 7/19/23 Feat. Adafruit Matrix Portal S3 CircuitPython Powered Internet Display!

Get the only spam-free daily newsletter about wearables, running a "maker business", electronic tips and more! Subscribe at AdafruitDaily.com !



No Comments

No comments yet.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.