Optimization-Assisted Building Design Cases study of design optimization based on real-world projects

Computational design optimization has been widely considered a promising technique to help designers address complex design challenges regarding building performance. However, a barrier to applying it to real-world projects is the difficulty in incorporating functional requirements and constraints into the design optimization process. In response, this study presents an optimization-assisted design approach for early-stage architectural design. The approach combines the application of EvoMass, an integrated building mass design generation and optimization tool, and the soft constraint strategy. The combination allows designers to integrate various design requirements and constraints into the optimization, which makes it produce results with higher practical values. To demonstrate the efficacy of the approach, two case studies are presented, which show that the application of optimization facilitates designers to better formulate the design problem and rapidly investigate different design directions for exploration and information extraction.