3xLP by Christopher Romano and Nicholas Bruscia has finally been announced as the winner of SKIN – the international digital fabrication competition, organized by TEX-FAB Digital Fabrication Alliance. Regarding the jury, TEX-FAB invited five leading figures in the world of digital fabrication and parametric design to jury the competition with a global understanding and presence within the digital design and fabrication communities. Their goal was to enable the role of digital fabrication and parametric design at the speculative level.
The competition began with 68 entries from 14 countries and the first round ended in July. It seems it was no hard task for the jury back then – the entry was selected without much deliberation and with just few comments on how small undulations or changing panels can have dramatic impact from the viewing standpoint moving around the building, boldness of the prototype and super clean design. The jury was impressed by the depth of their engagement with the primary concepts and the way they have engaged with the manufacturer in order to test and investigate those ideas.
Neil Denary however stated that for young designers the criteria is about how much shock value can be put into a project and that it surely intensified the level of research towards plausibility – the more possible it becomes, the more shocking in is. Therefore if 3xLP became the one that could achieve the greatest level of plausibility it yields the highest potential shock value, in his opinion.
The challenge this particular design will have to cope with will possibly be how to adapt the original concept to an actual façade component, regarding many joints and many parts which will be exposed to the basis forces and environmental conditions which every façade must survive and protect the building against.