ecoLogicStudio presents “Habitat One: Sustainable Shelter”. Developed in collaboration with Hyundai Motor Company, ecoLogicStudio’s first Korean solo show opened on March 18th, 2023 at the Hyundai Motorstudio Seoul.
On the façade of the iconic Hyundai Motorstudio Seoul’s building, which will glow with a bright green aura for the occasion, ecoLogicStudio projects an unreleased AI (Artificial Intelligence) video piece, entitled “Habitat One: The architecture of the carbon neutral city”, which has been specifically developed and designed for the show.
In its seemingly endless looping, the video simulates several scenarios for the evolution of Seoul into a carbon neutral city. In a multi-layered cyclical process, the city grows through the remetabolization of urban air pollution, waste and the storing of CO2.
Hi-density metropolitan clusters populate with ski-gardens, bio-buildings and eventually lush urban forests to evolve into new constructed landscapes. Trees and buildings alternate, literally evolving from each other, following the circular model pioneered in the Tree One sculpture.
This process is envisioned in a second AI video, projected inside the foyer and facing Tree One. Each architectural cluster is depicted while growing from a bundle of photosynthetic systems that propel self-sufficiency and the transformation of pollutants into material resources and nutritious aliments.
At the heart of the main exhibition floor is Tree One, the living carbon capturing sculpture designed by artificial intelligence and bio-digitally grown. The sculpture re-metabolises and stores the carbon molecules into its trunk and canopy while releasing Oxygen in the atmosphere.
The Tree One exhibited at the Hyundai Motorstudio Seoul integrates 40 glass photobioreactors hosting 500 liters of living Cyanidium algae cultures. These can capture as much carbon dioxide as 12 large trees, the equivalent of a small urban forest.
The main structure of Tree One is designed by algorithms whose recognition of arboreal systems negotiates the architectural logic of the column. The Tree One trunk is entirely made of algae-based biopolymers and its strength derives primarily from the unique pleated morphology inspired by the fibrous trunk of actual trees.
Its construction was made possible by a pioneering robotic 3D printing process. The fibrous system continues in the large 3D printed canopy in the form of hundreds of thin shading branches hovering above the gallery floor, close to the mezzanine gallery.
The gallery is occupied by the Bio Lab, showcasing the process of bio-digital synthesis of Tree One and of the carbon neutral city. Designed as an open laboratory, the Bio Lab presents the proprietary bio-design innovation that was developed to create Tree One.
It is the educational component of the exhibition, aiming to inspire visitors by showing the tangible research and innovation that ecoLogicStudio is currently conducting to make the sustainable design visions promoted by the exhibition, a reality. At the entrance of the Bio Lab is a PhotoSynthetica reactor wall that integrates a biomass harvesting system.
The PhotoSynthetica reactor wall is fed by nutrients from the Biosphere and pollutants from the Urbansphere. Visitors can then follow the steps of the bio-polymerization process, to observe a catalogue of biomaterial samples, several large scale 3D printed biodegradable products, prototypes and a didactic video on the synthesis of Tree One. On show at the Hyundai Motorstudio Seoul until May 2023. Source by ecoLogicStudio.
- Location: Hyundai Motorstudio Seoul, Korea
- Design: ecoLogicStudio (Claudia Pasquero and Marco Poletto)
- Habitat One The architecture of the carbon neutral city: project team: Claudia Pasquero, Marco Poletto with Bo Liu, Simon Meng, Lucas Ursprung
- Academic partners: The Synthetic Landscape Lab at Innsbruck University, The Urban Morphogenesis Lab at the Bartlett UCL
- Tree One project team: Claudia Pasquero, Marco Poletto with Kostantina Bikou, Haoyi Chen, Seung Joon Oh, Alessandra Poletto, Emiliano Rando, Engjell Rodiqi
- Academic partners: The Synthetic Landscape Lab at Innsbruck University, The Urban Morphogenesis Lab at the Bartlett UCL.
- robotic 3D printing support: Beijing Dileyou, Nagami
- Installation support: PSpace
- Bio Lab project team: Claudia Pasquero, Marco Poletto with Kostantina Bikou, Haoyi Chen, Mangesh Kurund, Seung Joon Oh, Violeta Perez Urtado, Alessandra Poletto, Emiliano Rando, Engjell Rodiqi, Lucas Ursprung
- Academic partners: The Synthetic Landscape Lab at Innsbruck University, The Urban Morphogenesis Lab at the Bartlett UCL.
- Installation support: PSpace
- Dates: 18 March — May 2023
- Photographs: Yoon Joonhwan, Courtesy of MINT LIST
