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Aarhus School of Architecture
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Alan Mee
Architectures, Spatial Chaos and Complex Adaptive Systems
By analysing distinct spatial phenomena observed at urban design and architectural scales in selected locations of the designed environment, this investigation identifies manifestations and characteristics of a particular type of change in cities, including alterations in spatial quality, and also categorises and contextualises these instances on the ground.
The PhD work provides a detailed portrayal of these conditions through the use of case study subunit analysis of three sites within the expanding city of Dublin, Ireland, related to changes of an unprecedented extent and nature which occurred there as a result of the worldwide economic boom which ended in 2008. The work reviews the relevance of critical spatial theory to the cases described, and links these to established theories of complexity and chaos of cities, together presented here as a means to describe and interpret significant change in these environments.
This paper describes preliminary results for one subunit site at architectural scales from a multi-method research strategy, which furthers the central proposition of this work: that certain types of change in the designed environment may be described as spatial chaos. An innovative combination of spatial and configurational analysis methods is employed, including graphical interpretative material and space syntax analysis.
A major objective of the work is to advance, analyse and put into one specific real context the culture and theory around spatially complex and chaotic situations. An additional aim is to employ creative spatial method and practice to explore and analyse these conditions, and further the argument that certain architectures and locations have potential to evolve towards and within complex adaptive spatial systems.
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