Revisiting the Analogy of the Building Envelope and the Skin: a Biomimetic Perspective

Abstract

In the 20th century, advancements in science and technology enabled us to extract nature's genius to solve the problems of humankind. The mind shift brought by biological knowledge and computational thinking, and advancements in digital fabrication technologies opened a new era in architecture's relationship with nature. The skin analogy has been magnified in many built and unbuilt examples of building envelopes and research and experiments in the field. This paper aims to uncover the potential of the analogy of the skin and building envelope with a biomimetic perspective. It proposes taking skin as a model not only to increase the efficiency of the building envelopes but also to develop new features such as multi-functionality and adaptivity. It also aims to contribute to the use of biomimetics to create more sustainable envelopes that inherits not only the formal but also the functional and ecologically beneficial properties of the skin. The initial research highlighted the basic principles and perspectives of this approach to develop further investigations.