Information, Complexity and the Detail

The proliferation of affordable computing has transformed the capability of architecture to deal with complex forms and details. As Dennis R Shelden, Chief Technology Officer of Gehry Technologies, explains, this has resulted in the production of an abundance of digital information or data. The intersection of two curved surfaces, for instance, is now much more complex than the surfaces themselves. Complexity requires more information and thus more processing, making details like this ultimately more expensive to produce. The jury is still out on what the future might hold, as architecture undergoes a period of fundamental transition in which, for the time being at least, there remains an essential mismatch between the surfeit of digital information and the tight economic limits on physical production.