Date 15.12.2020

Location Hong Kong

The trio “School Redesign for Well-being” projects led by our Prof. Thomas Chung and PhD student Jimmy Ho, as well as the “Reimagine Timber Architecture in Post-digital Era: Catenary Timber Structure” by our alumnus Nichol Wong (BSSc 2016, MArch 2019), win the Most Outstanding Designs of the DesignInspire 2020 Exhibition “Reimage, Repurpose, Redesign for Good”.

For the series of “School Redesign” projects, they are part of a more extensive design-research collaboration with primary schools to renovate school environments to enhance individual well-being. The team started by identifying the school community’s needs, followed by an iterative co-design process, and then proceeded to refine their design strategies and construct operational prototypes. All three projects (“Communal Identity Boulevard” at Fung Kai Liu Yun Sum Primary School; “Outdoor Playful Landscape” at Pat Heung Central Primary School; “Adaptable STEM Room” at Po Leung Kuk CASTAR Primary School) emphasise the application of place-making concepts.

Nichol Wong’s project focuses on one type of hyper-light-weight system: Catenary Timber Structures. They are a structural suspension system in which the form is generated by the weight of the structure itself, forming a tension-only system in which every part of the form is in equilibrium. This system is much more material-efficient, cost-effective and ecologically sustainable than conventional girders under bending stress, as the use of material strength is at its maximum throughout the suspended beam section. The project aims to simplify construction complexity by applying computational tools, and expanding the design solution space of non-standard timber architecture.