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Maker Faire Austin 2008
Digitally Fabricated Housing: Build a house with a computer, a ShopBot, and a rubber mallet
Maker Stage , Sunday 12:30 PM - 1:00 PM
Dennis will discuss the ShopBot house he helped build at MOMA out of 600+ sheets of plywood. The project was called, "yourHouse: Digitally Fabricated Housing for New Orleans." It was the effort of Larry Sass and two principal associates, Dan Smithwick and Dennis Michaud (as well as a dozen of Larry’s other students). The house is an extension of Larry’s work on digital fabrication. The team is attempting to harness the speed and precision of digital cutters to fabricate simple shelters quickly and inexpensively. With Larry's building technique, joinery takes the form of precise, interlocking, notches and grooves rather than traditional screws or nails. The idea is that the parts can be cut at or near the building site using locally available sheet material. Then a crew without construction expertise can fit the parts together in just a few days, doing it as they would with a picture puzzle or Lego model, locking pieces into place with nothing more than a rubber mallet, yet creating a sturdy, permanent structure.
Web site: http://www.shopbottools.com/teds_report.htm#House%20Update
About the Maker(s)
Dennis Michaud
Dennis has collaborated on various commissioned residential projects in the US and Asia centered on ecologically sustainable and equitable building and development strategies. He has also helped lead multiple design teams for innovative solutions to using new materials, assembly systems, delivery methods, and technologies within the field of architecture, work from which was invited to various international design exhibitions, conferences, and publications, including the prestigious Venice Biennale and the eCAADe conference. Most recently, Dennis co-lead an MIT research group in the design, technical development, and production of a full-scale, “Digitally Fabricated House for New Orleans,” commissioned by and exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Dennis received his Masters of Architecture from MIT in 2008 and is currently VP of Product Development at the healthy, prefab homes company Blu Homes.
Maker Faire is sponsored by:
