Don’t Just Follow These Recipes:
Much like cooking, we could say that design and computation both involve a number of specific ingredients or inputs (data, geometry, text), which when guided by a recipe (process), can be manipulated using tools and techniques, towards an intentioned output (strategy).
The Smorgasboard, then, is a series of exercises in following a recipe. (e.g. ‘How to bake a cake’). The goal is to follow a recipe and become familiar with processes, tools and techniques, to prepare for a creative and exploratory classroom context.
A chef, however, does not follow recipes, but also invents them. Similarly, the goal of the CDP program is to not simply to follow tutorials. We encourage thinking critically and inventively about computation and the built environment, so that by the end of the CDP program, you might create your own recipes and experiments.
We recommend that you treat the Smorgasbord as a series of exercises to be both understood and modified, the same way you might alter or tweak any recipe. Try them out, see what you discover, tweak them, share your modifications.
How To Use This Site
What follows is a series of potential approaches to the Smorgasbord, ranging from the step by step, to the exploratory.
If you'd like to try everything:
- Do all the tutorials.
If you’re relatively new to computation or programming:
Assuming that you're familiar with Rhino, start with
- Programming for Design Practices A: Grasshopper,
- Mapping and Data
and make your way deeper into
- Programming for Design Practices B: Python
- Programming for Design Practices C: Web and Interactivity
If you’re relatively new to architecture and 3d modeling:
Assuming that you're familiar with some programming language such as Java, Python, or Javascript, start with
- Computational Drawing
- Mapping and Data
and make your way deeper into computation with
- Programming for Design Practices A: Grasshopper,
- Programming for Design Practices B: Python
