The roman town Silchester is an interesting case if we analyze it at three
scales. It can be seen through its irregular border containing strictly divided cells with ‘random’ clustered buildings in each. What fascinates me is the ‘logic randomness’ that is completely unexpected if we compare it to the rigorous meticulousness of roman military camps. Nevertheless, with some effort one can start to detect logical patterns and that is the first approach that I would consider in this project.
Another way of thinking about a camp is to have a predefined building element that will be repeated according to a certain parameter. Or we could take a predefined shape and fit the element in it. I have previously considered this approach in a similar studio program, and this is why other ideas are more compelling for me.
The approach I find the most fascinating is to observe clustering in every layer of ‘making’ architecture. What if we could define a path around which we would cluster buildings, object, elements and atoms? Or what if we could use clustering in a broader sense and try to cluster these predefined paths too? I would like to test the k-means clustering method on the given terrain to find areas satisfying certain parameters. Than it would be exiting to observe clustering in different directions and rates depending on the program and the needs. Although this might not lead to a successful solution, I am interested in exploring such potential.
