Dealing with Data

Sammanfattning: Being an architect means dealing with data. All architectural thinking—whether it is done with pen and paper or the most advanced modeling softwares—starts with data, conveying information about the world, and ultimately outputs data, in the form of drawings or models. Reality is neither the input nor the output. All architectural work is abstractions of reality, mediated by data. What if data, the abstractions of reality that are crucial for our work as architects, was to be used more literally? Could data actually be turned into architecture? Could data be turned into, for example, a volume, a texture, or an aperture? What qualities would such an architecture have?  These questions form the basis of this thesis project. The topic was investigated first by developing a simple design method for generating architectural forms from data, through an iterative series of tests. Then, the design method was applied to create a speculative design proposal for a combined data center and museum, located in Södermalm, Stockholm.