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The Bartlett School of Architecture

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Augmented Carpentry

Aleksandr Baranovskij

How can improvisation, adaptation, and whimsy be deployed as architectural methods, while keeping within the tight tolerances of timber fabrication? Pre-planning may forego the subtle details of a site, which are often only made apparent after spending time in it. 

The aim of this project is to find methods of fabricating architecture in an improvised manner, allowing for adjustability and adaptability at the whim of the designer or fabricator. This means that the eventual outcome can be informed by the designer’s sensibilities and sensitivity to their immediate context. 

The project results in a series of ‘tool augmentations’– precisely fabricated jigs and armatures that guide more traditional hand tools. These augmentations embed the precise work planes of the workshop into the objects themselves, allowing a more flexible relationship to be developed between the design and fabrication of timber structures.


Images

1. Jig enabling precise cut under any angle.
2. Jig in position on timber before the cut.
3. Jig enabling cut for repeatable specific angle.