Digital Considerations for a Circular Future

Key Tool Showcase: Rhino to Revit Interoperability with Rhino.Inside, Beam and Speckle. Using LLM's to create a custom pyrevit toolbar. Using Grasshopper to create low-fi automation scripts. It is predicted that by 2050, we will need to double our global building stock. A key challenge for the AEC industry lies in how we can accommodate this expansion in a more climate-sensitive manner. At 3XN/GXN, a research and architecture practice from Copenhagen, we believe that Circular Economy Principles, particularly through adaptability and material reuse, are fundamental to this approach. This will require more extensive technical analysis to be undertaken earlier in the design process. For design-focused architecture firms like 3XN/GXN, a core challenge is how to achieve this while maintaining the design creativity and rigor that set our architecture apart. This session will demonstrate how we at 3XN/GXN facilitate this interplay in a world of increased deliverables, faster timelines, and smaller teams. We will explore how we have adopted open-source concepts—inspired by GitHub—democratized interoperability where software expertise is limited, and implemented a naming system to lay the groundwork for a software-agnostic future. The implementation of these ideas will be illustrated through two commercial tower projects in London. We will examine the design and digital processes behind early massing studies, utilizing low-fi scripting to analyse dozens of massing options. Additionally, we will explore rapid façade prototyping techniques and demonstrate how we use data rich scripts to automate the production of Rhino and Revit models. This presentation will highlight how a more climate-sensitive approach has led to a 'new normal' set of design considerations. It will then delve into how digital tools have been adapted to support this approach, revealing how these methods have been applied in real-world case studies.