biomimetics

Article
3D-Printed Biodigital Clay Bricks
Yomna K. Abdallah 1,2 and Alberto T. Estévez 1, *

1 iBAG-UIC Barcelona, Institute for Biodigital Architecture & Genetics, Universitat Internacional de Catalunya,
08017 Barcelona, Spain; [email protected]
2 Department of Interior Design, Faculty of Applied Arts, Helwan University, Cairo 11111, Egypt
* Correspondence: [email protected]

Abstract: Construction materials and techniques have witnessed major advancements due to the
application of digital tools in the design and fabrication processes, leading to a wide array of
possibilities, especially in additive digital manufacturing tools and 3D printing techniques, scales,
and materials. However, possibilities carry responsibilities with them and raise the question of the
sustainability of 3D printing applications in the built environment in terms of material consumption
and construction processes: how should one use digital design and 3D printing to achieve minimum
material use, minimum production processes, and optimized application in the built environment?
In this work, we propose an optimized formal design of “Biodigital Barcelona Clay Bricks” to achieve
sustainability in the use of materials. These were achieved by using a bottom-up methodology of
biolearning to extract the formal grammar of the bricks that is suitable for their various applications in
the built environment as building units, thereby realizing the concept of formal physiology, as well as
employing the concept of fractality or pixilation by using 3D printing to create the bricks as building
units on an architectural scale. This enables the adoption of this method as an alternative construction




procedure instead of conventional clay brick and full-scale 3D printing of architecture on a wider and

 more democratic scale, avoiding the high costs of 3D printing machines and lengthy processes of the
Citation: Abdallah, Y.K.; one-step, 3D-printed, full-scale architecture, while also guaranteeing minimum material consumption
Estévez, A.T. 3D-Printed Biodigital and maximum forma–function coherency. The “Biodigital Barcelona Clay Bricks” were developed
Clay Bricks. Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59. using Rhinoceros 3D and Grasshopper 3D + Plugins (Anemone and Kangaroo) and were 3D printed
https://doi.org/10.3390/ in clay.
biomimetics6040059
Keywords: clay bricks; 3D-printed bricks; 3D printed architecture; fractal dimension; form finding;
Academic Editor: Andrew biolearning; biodigital; reaction diffusion; shortest path; sustainability; material consumption
Adamatzky

Received: 8 July 2021

Accepted: 5 October 2021
1. Introduction
Published: 7 October 2021
As an urgent worldwide demand, achieving sustainability in the construction sectors
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral
has become a vital need. As the construction sector is responsible for the consumption of
with regard to jurisdictional claims in
almost half of the raw materials and energy of the planet [1,2], resulting in a great impact on
published maps and institutional affil- the depletion of the planet nonrenewable resources, as well as the emission of greenhouse
iations. gas from the combustion of fossil fuel [2,3]. It is also undeniable that the construction
industry is a major sector of the contemporary world’s economy [4], consisting of a USD
10 trillion industry and accounting for 13% of the world’s GDP in 2018; this industry
is projected to increase to USD 14 trillion by 2025 [5] In the construction realm, as an
important part of the world’s economy, it is wise to reduce the materials and processes that
Copyright: © 2021 by the authors.
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
are involved in the construction practice. This concept is essential in designing construction
This article is an open access article
processes, techniques and durability of the resulting structures.
distributed under the terms and In essence, minimizing material usage and construction time has provoked the emer-
conditions of the Creative Commons gence of pre-fabricated solutions that have been reintroduced recurrently along with
Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// different architectural trends with different available design and fabrication technologies,
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ for example, the American Balloon structure systems [6] that are based on assembling
4.0/).

Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59. https://doi.org/10.3390/biomimetics6040059 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/biomimetics

Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 2 of 15

pre-fabricated units. These pre-fabricated construction solutions emerged to achieve time-

process sustainability. However, these methods belonged to the Zeitgeist of their times,
solving the challenges of their times. When it comes to the contemporary construction
industry, the situation does not seem the same. Reusing the same lengthy traditional
construction processes, building with concrete column–beam systems that utilize incom-
patible materials with the environment or their time [3]. Since the arrival of clay bricks
in the 1980s, their market has started to decrease, due to construction systems that are
based on exterior enclosures of concrete blocks [2]. These systems are also dependent on
conventional dense bricks that lack intelligence in their structural density distribution, nor
do they possess any particular formal adequacy for their structural function [2,7]. This
conventional brick form defies multiple spatio-physical laws by being limited to a stiff
bounding box that cannot generate an optimum minimal surface, neither on its own nor
in its replicative group. This is evidenced by the technological barriers caused by the
inability to use these conventional bricks in low height buildings due to weight limits, as
well as their environmental inadequacy as they fail to achieve thermal insulation, requiring
further processes and materials to achieve insulation [8]. As well as the formal limitation,
limiting the architectural forms to specific orthogonal forms that can be achieved with
these primitive orthogonal conventional bricks.
On the other hand, the rapid advancement in digital design and fabrication techniques
has been able to break these rigid, limited forms by adopting various strategies of digital
fabrication, especially additive manufacturing, and developing cohesion between the de-
sign initiation, simulation, and execution accurately. Furthermore, nowadays, 3D printing
is gaining more attention from researchers and stakeholders in the construction industry
due to simplification of the construction process into a one-step printing procedure with
the ability to print with a wide array of materials that can be synthesized, tuned, and
customized to fully control the 3D printing material deposition. Basically, 3D printing, is
an additive manufacturing technology that is able to produce complex shape geometries
from a 3D model on a layer-by-layer basis. It has the potential to reduce material waste,
decrease labor cost and facilitates fast production [9,10] It is undeniable that these full-
scale, 3D-printed buildings (bio-plastic micro-homes, The Netherlands, DUS Architects;
Tecla, Italy, Mario Cucinella Architects and WASP; Project Milestone, The Netherlands,
Eindhoven University of Technology, etc.) [11,12] are major steps in integrating 3D print-
ing as an applicable construction tool in the built environment. However, the feasibility
of their mass production, along with cost effectiveness and real functional architectural
programs, remains a significant challenge due to high cost of full-scale 3D printers and
robotic arms, in comparison to disk-top or limited-scale 3D printers. The average clay 3D
printer’s cost is between USD3,000 and 10,000, and it is easy to purchase online and can be
used multiple times with no charge except for the construction material. [13], whereas the
cheapest construction via 3D printing for one building costs between USD4,000 and 9,000,
which only accounts for the construction material cost, not taking into account the high
machinery cost that is provided only in special price quotes to large construction companies
for only one 3D-printed building (as in Austin and Tabasco Houses, Austin, Texas; Tabasco,
Mexico, 2018–2020, by Icon, and Gaia, Northern Italy, 2018, by Wasp) [14]. A considerable
number of these examples are stuck in the phase of being mockups, and more research is
pending regarding their interaction with the user, the environment, and physical forces
and conditions. The majority of these examples follow the igloo house model that lacks
real operative architectural programming or the ability to expand to encompass more than
the simple singular function of each of these projects. Moreover, using 3D printing of
concrete for houses and villas has better prospect than construction of large structures [15],
due to various deficiencies such as limited capacity of 3D printer for high-rise buildings,
insufficient printing materials (especially for load-bearing components), low level of cus-
tomization, and complexity involved in the information processing from design to tangible
objects. [15,16]. However, 3D printing has been successfully explored in printing pedestrian
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 3 of 15

bridges, quick building of disaster relief shelters, structural and non-structural elements
with complex geometries, printing molds for load bearing components, etc. [15–17].
Thus, there is a trial to exploit the maximum developments in 3D printing as a sustain-
able construction tool in terms of process count and material usage. As, among the numer-
ous prospects of 3D printing in construction that were reported in recent studies, cheaper
construction, reduced material use, improved safety, less reliance on human resources,
better branding and market share, and durable and sustainable construction [9,10,18,19].
In this work, we propose the pixelation or the tessellation of the architectural construction
process by 3D printing building units or bricks to attain sustainability through two main
aspects: minimum material usage and formal sufficiency through fractal dimensions. A
bottom-up methodology justifies this proposal of the fractal dimension aspect of 3D-printed
architecture as it exploits the advantages of both the modular collaborative construction
system (bricks) and 3D-printed architecture techniques.
Thus, the objective of this work was to employ form intelligence in the bricks’ design
to achieve sustainability (less material and various formal iterations) in a single brick
and in its replica while maintaining the smallest amount of material consumption and
fabrication processes as possible. This article focuses on the state-of-the-art of clay as
the building material of bricks, including the chemical and physical properties of clay,
full-scale vernacular clay architecture examples and their limitations, contemporary clay
bricks, and examples of digitally designed clay bricks. Algorithm-aided design and 3D
printing were employed in the design and fabrication of the “Biodigital Barcelona Bricks”.
These bricks were designed using a reaction–diffusion algorithm simulating the reaction of
water diffusion in a clay brick based on its hydrophilic nature and connecting the latest
point in water absorption in this clay brick through the shortest path algorithm to achieve
material density optimization that is informed by natural models. Then, this optimized
brick design was manipulated through different spatial iterations following the formal
physiology of each design case, as well as achieving sustainability in the construction
process by using 3D printing on a fractal scale. Representing 3D-printed bricks as “building
units”, “pixels”, and “collaborative construction systems”: all these concepts take into
account a similar sense of the definition of bricks while depending on different criteria.
“Building units” term was used as the constructional definition of bricks. “Collaborative
systems” term was used in the sense of biological references of similar systems that are
composed of many assembled smaller parts or agents, and “pixels” term was used in
the sense of digital interpretation of a surface or a volume. All these terms explain the
“fractal dimension” that was pivotal to accomplishing the objective of this paper. This 3D
printed architecture pixilation offers a vanguard method to popularize, democratize, and
facilitate the usage of 3D printing as an efficient and affordable tool in the architectural
construction realm, avoiding the high cost of full-scale, one-step, 3D-printed architecture
or uncontrolled material deposition, thereby achieving 3D-printed architecture in a flexible
and sustainable way, in addition to its endless formal iterations. A diagram describing the
research methodology and sections is provided in Figure 1.
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 4 of 15

Figure 1. Diagram showing the objective and methodology of the 3D-printed Biodigital Barcelona
Bricks. The diagram also shows the different sections of this paper’s structure and their relevance to
the objective. (By the authors).

2. Clay Bricks in Architecture

Clay is one of the most abundant and traditional building materials in the world.
Given the length of time it has been used for, building with clay has always been a cost-
effective, easy, and sustainable approach. The proof of this lays not only in the fact that
clay is a very common substance, but also that between one-half and two-thirds of the
world’s population still live or work in buildings made with clay, often baked into brick, as
an essential part of their load-bearing structures [20,21].
The defining mechanical properties of clay are its plasticity when wet and its ability
to harden when dried or fired. Clays show a broad range of water contents within which
they are highly plastic, from a minimum water content (called the plasticity limit) where
the clay is just moist enough to mold, to a maximum water content (called the liquid limit)
where the molded clay is just dry enough to hold its shape [22]. High-quality clay is also
tough, as measured by the amount of mechanical work required to roll a sample of clay
flat. Its toughness reflects a high degree of internal cohesion [22].
Clay has a high content of clay minerals that give it its plasticity. Clay minerals are
hydrous aluminum phyllosilicate minerals composed of aluminum and silicon ions bonded
into tiny, thin plates by interconnecting oxygen and hydroxyl ions. These plates are tough
but flexible, and in moist clay, they adhere to each other. The resulting aggregates give clay
the cohesion that makes it plastic [23]. When the clay is dried, most of the water molecules
are removed, and the plates’ hydrogen binds directly to each other so that the dried clay
is rigid but still fragile. When the clay is fired to the earthenware stage, a dehydration
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 5 of 15

reaction removes additional water from the clay, causing the clay plates to irreversibly
adhere to each other via stronger covalent bonding, which strengthens the material.
The tiny size and plate form of clay particles give clay minerals a high surface area.
In some clay minerals, the plates carry a negative electrical charge that is balanced by a
surrounding layer of positive ions (cations), such as sodium, potassium, or calcium. If
the clay is mixed with a solution containing other cations, these can swap places with the
cations in the layer around the clay particles, which gives clays a high capacity for ion
exchange [23]. The chemistry of clay minerals, including their capacity to retain nutrient
cations such as potassium and ammonium, is important for soil fertility.
On the other hand, composing a bio-based material requires concrete knowledge of
what the base should be and what the filament should be and, in between them, what can
enhance their coherence and total physical, chemical, and mechanical properties. Based
on the mentioned properties of clay, it is the most prominent candidate for serving as
a base material due to its high surface area as well as being the most widely available
mineral possessing unique crystal structures, cation exchange capabilities, plastic behavior
when wet, and catalytic abilities. Moreover, clay is a bio-receptive material that boosts
the growth of living organisms such as plants and algae. This bio-receptive capacity of
clay bricks has even been discussed in association with conventional construction systems
using bricks and mortar [24], where the high moisture content of both bricks and mortar
has been described as a pivotal criterion in boosting the bio-receptivity of these materials.
An example of bio-receptive clay building units is the precedent in Richard Beckett’s
“Bio-receptive Tile Bricks”. Another example was communicated in [25] work, proposing
biomimetic place-based design (BPD) as an approach for integrating biological strategies
developed by ‘champion adapters’ within the ecosystems via translating their logics into
design principles for built environment design and engineering. This approach supports
a design that is locally attuned, adaptable, and resilient to local operating conditions
and challenges [25,26]. These properties enable greater application in many industries
and clay-based materials. Thus, building with clay has always been a sustainable, cost-
effective method due to its very low environmental impact, easy excavation, and simple
processing and production methods. However, building with clay according to common
methods is not easy, nor is it standardized for applications on a large and rapid scale. For
example, the Mousgoum building technique in Africa [27] is an example of sustainable
clay buildings having a very solid construction, as they have thicker walls at the base
and thinner walls at the top, which enhances the structure’s strength while being highly
textured to allow individualization of the surface, offering a drainage function, natural
thermal insulation, and passive cooling due to clay’s hydrophilic nature. However, these
Mousgoum structures require frequent maintenance of the coating, and they are unsuitable
for use in rainy climates. Another example of sustainable clay architecture is exhibited
in Hassan Fathy’s earthen architecture in Egypt. Fathy’s Nubian clay domes and the
unique architectural programming nourished and influenced by the Islamic architectural
passive cooling elements have enabled the design and construction of a vernacular clay
architecture that is environmentally friendly and sufficiently sustainable [28]. Figure 2
exhibits the vernacular clay architecture in Africa, showing simple building technologies
that are mainly based on hand labor.
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 6 of 15

Figure 2. Vernacular clay architecture in Africa with simple building technologies: (a) shows Mousgoum houses built
with clay by manual methods, while (b) exhibits the ruins of some of these Mousgoum houses due to cracking or poor
rain resistance due to the hydrophilic nature of clay materials, and (c) exhibits earthen architecture by Hassan Fathy in
New Gourna village in South Egypt, exploiting the passive cooling nature of clay materials through employing it in the
design and construction of passive cooling Islamic architectural elements [29] (Photos: Institute of Nomadic Architecture.
http://artsection.org/mousgoum.html).

However, these vernacular clay architecture examples are the results of their time and
the technology available for material synthesis and construction techniques. Not to men-
tion their insufficiency in material consumption control, or the lengthy time they require
for building a single housing unit. In our current biodigital age where rapid advancement
is occurring equally and in parallel in both in biotechnology and digitalization, the syn-
thesis of clay materials and adequate physiological design forms are informed by digital
data. These digital tools have enabled the direct insertion and realization of biological
physiological forms that are biolearned from nature [30], thereby solving the relevance of
the physiological form of a material structure from the micro to the macro level through
topology, mechanical simulation, and formal optimization, accordingly. Few recent design
projects have tackled this relation between 3D printed Brick’s formal design and sustain-
ability. For example, the Twisted Tower developed by the Plasma Studio, that used robotic
printing arms to 3D print 2000 3D-printed terracotta bricks [31]. Another experimentation
on formal design optimization to achieve structural efficiency is evident in “Building Bytes
3D printed Bricks” by Brayan peters that has adapted a desktop 3D printer to produce
ceramic bricks for building architectural structures. Predicting that 3D printers will become
portable, inexpensive brick factories for large-scale construction, with the implementation
of several 3D printers that could work simultaneously on site using pre-made or locally
manufactured material [32]. Despite these previous trials to optimize the formal design
of a brick to achieve structural efficiency, they lacked the biolearning reference of formal
physiology. As the majority of the reached bricks’ forms resulting from these studies, did
not follow biological logics that are related to the typical design case. Furthermore, 3D
printing in Clay is still in need for further experimentation, as it undergoes significant
alteration before, during and after 3D printing. Material properties of clay as viscosity,
color, and texture, as well as printing sittings and tools (i.e., 3D printer, extrusion nozzle,
tool paths, etc.) are among the variables that have major effects on the form resolution of
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 7 of 15

the final outcome. This way, 3D printing with clay still requires formal customization to
attain maximum resolution with minimum material deposition [33]. Thus, in the current
work and in the following section, we propose formal physiological optimization for the
material deposition, based on the specific customized logic of the physical and chemical
properties of clay, using a biodigital design method.

3. Form Physiology of the Biodigital Clay Brick (Reaction Diffusion and Shortest Path)
From a biolearning point of view, physiology is the scientific study of functions and
mechanisms in a living system. Physiology focuses on how organisms, organ systems,
individual organs, cells, and biomolecules carry out their chemical and physical functions
in a living system [34], whereas histology is the microscopic anatomy or microanatomy of
biological tissues. Looking deeply into these two concepts, a strong bond always exists to
relate the shape or form to its function. Human beings have always been subconsciously
aware of this interdependent form–physiology relation, and they have applied it in design-
ing their lives, from the simplest utilities to the largest shelters. Of course, the maturity,
scale, and level of processing and integrating this concept in the design process has always
been dependent on the level of invasion and magnification of visualization and analysis of
the natural source of inspiration. This multi-scale biolearning started by the mere imitation
of successful bio examples that applied the concept of formal physiology on a “macro”
scale, for example, Gaudi’s Casa Batllo Bony Facade. Moving forward in time and in
technological advancement, the level of invasion and magnification of these sources of
inspiration has matured the biolearning process and enabled deep understanding and
integration of the concept of formal physiology, from design to production. Complying
with this concept, the Biodigital Barcelona Bricks presented in this work applied formal
physiology in their formal design to achieve sustainability through minimum material
usage and form-function adequacy. In the current study, a digital simulation was applied
to perform a two-step simulation of the reaction–diffusion behavior based on clay’s hy-
drophilic properties and water content diffusion through its particles, as well as tuning
the structural coherency of the resulting forms by applying the shortest path algorithm to
minimize the distance between every two bearing points in the brick’s design, resulting in
a distributed load effect. As implied from the structural function of the bricks, the function
can be broken down into its physical and mechanical requirements [35]. The first of these
requirements is the load distribution avoiding stress being concentrated over specific points.
The second is achieving maximum coherency and strength with the minimum amount of
material. Figure 3. Exhibits the followed methods to design and fabricate the proposed
biodigital bricks.

3.1. Form Physiology: Biodigital Form-Finding, Simulation, and Optimization

Recently, achieving sustainability in the built environment takes the track of material
customization and control. This is focused on developing the formal design of clay-based
materials that open both the possibilities of integrating biodigital generative forms of digital
DNA that is the algorithms or digital codes that are responsible for specific formal pheno-
types that are extracted from the shape grammars of the original biological reference, or via
hosting natural organisms or parts of them (as bacteria, fungi, algae, cells, genes, etc.) in an
autonomous way to attain generative behavioral materials. These materials also facilitate
the shape-changing of architectural elements, enabling the design process to include real-
time morphogenesis by integrating an organism that grows and interacts with a consortium
of materials, that compos its microenvironment. This aspect opens infinite applications
of self-healing, clay-based materials and morphogenetic architecture in real performance,
which are still a novel multidisciplinary field that requires further contributions.
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 8 of 15

Figure 3. Methodology of achieving Formal Physiology of the 3D printed Biodigital Barcelona Clay Bricks.

Clay bricks in our biodigital age and by biodigital means, aims to achieve formal
physiological sufficiency using a biolearning method while maintaining ease of imple-
mentation, mass production, and standardization. These were applied in the design and
fabrication of the Biodigital Barcelona Bricks that were generatively designed using a
form-finding process utilizing branching and reaction–diffusion algorithms to simulate the
physical reaction of aqueous diffusion in clay. Reaction–diffusion systems are mathematical
models which correspond to several physical phenomena. The most common of these is
the change in space and time of the concentration of one or more chemical substances due
to local chemical reactions and diffusion, which causes the substances to spread out over a
surface in space. Reaction–diffusion systems are naturally applied in chemistry, biology,
geology, and physics. Physically, the reaction–diffusion model describes the emergence of
periodic patterns such as spots, stripes, and mazes through chemical interaction among
cells [36]. In the current work, this was applied as a first step of form finding a simulation.
Through this simulation, the latest regions to absorb water (in clay) in the diffusion reaction
were then connected through a branching algorithm of the shortest path, which, at the
same time, describes a behavioral growth pattern found in nature. The shortest path, or
Dijkstra’s algorithm, is an algorithm for finding the shortest paths between nodes in a
graph, which may represent, for example, road networks. [37], and as the name of the
algorithm suggests, the “Shortest Path” was developed congruently with the structural
function of these bricks, shortening the span between each bearing’s solid point in order
to create a distributed load effect. In structural mechanics, the distributed load is a load
that is distributed continuously over a given area or along a given line. A continuous
load may be uniformly distributed, having a constant intensity, or vary according to some
specific patterns [38]. Thus, this shortest path algorithm applied in the current brick’s
form finding is congruent with achieving the distributed load by minimizing the distance
between each two points in the population of points composing the 3D space of this brick.
These form-finding simulations were performed in Rhinoceros 3D [39,40] (Anemone, and
Kangaroo and fabricated by 3D printing by Noumena in Barcelona from November 2020
to March 2021, with the measurements of the traditional Catalan manual ceramic brick
(4.5 × 14.5 × 29.5 cm).
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 9 of 15

As an initial step, the reaction–diffusion algorithm was employed to generate a dia-

gram of the latest points to absorb water or liquids based on the clay hydrophilic nature.
Given these maps that specify where the latest points to absorb liquids are, a shortest path
algorithm in Anemone was used to connect these points. Figure 4 shows the diagram of the
shortest path algorithm connecting the reaction–diffusion’s latest points to absorb water.

Figure 4. The shortest path algorithm in Grasshopper Anemone that was employed to connect the resultant latest points in
the reaction–diffusion system based on the hydrophilic nature of clay. This proves the structural coherence of the bricks’
design by minimizing the span between every two points while also minimizing the material consumption due to the
accurate distributed material deposition where needed. (a) the resultant shortest path diagram of the connected points
that were the last to absorb water in the volume of a conventional Catalan brick, and were resulting from the first step
simulation of reaction diffusion, (b) the grasshopper algorithm of the shortest path logic that was applied to connect the
result points from the first step simulation, in order to find the shortest distance between these points to minimize the span
between them to achieve distributed load and minimum material deposition as well. Images by the author.

The third step was to examine these resulting shortest paths forms for the final brick
resistance to cracking by applying a standard load simulation in Kangaroo, resulting in
different design iterations: V1, V2, and V3. The optimum design iterations for structural
behavior were selected to be further tested for various material densities, varying the
density of each brick in a bulk brick model from 25%, to 55%, 75%, and 95%, and a linear
or hollow brick model starting from the thickness of 0.25 cm, 0.55 cm, 0.75 cm, and 0.95 cm
for each iteration (V1, V2, and V3), as shown in Figures 5–7.
This density variation in the biodigital bricks’ iterations enabled the actual study of
the used material amount in these physical models, as well as their resistance to cracking.
A following research paper will exhibit in detail further mechanical tests to prove the
structural efficiency of the proposed forms of the biodigital bricks. This 3D printed material
examination customization was also reinforced by comparing to other digital fabrication
strategies that will be exhibited in the following section, to prove the competence of 3D
printing to achieve sustainability in material usage and production processes.
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 10 of 15

Figure 5. Alberto T. Estévez (Yomna K. Abdallah, computational designer), Biodigital Barcelona Bricks (3D-printed clay),
GENARQ/iBAG, UIC Barcelona. V1 design iteration of the Biodigital Barcelona Bricks showing the bricks’ varied material
density from a linear model of 0.5 cm thickness to a bulk model (a–d), with the densities of the brick varying from 25% to
55% and 75%, to experiment structurally different densities of the 3D-printed bricks. Images by the author.

Figure 6. Alberto T. Estévez (Yomna K. Abdallah, computational designer), Biodigital Barcelona Bricks (3D-printed clay),
GENARQ/iBAG, UIC Barcelona. V2 design iteration of the Biodigital Barcelona Bricks showing the bricks’ varied material
density from a linear model of 0.5 cm thickness in (a) to a bulk model, with densities of the brick varying from (b) 25%
material deposition density to (c) 55% material deposition density, (d) exhibits the original Catalan brick form and unified
density in comparison to the optimized proposed Biodigital Barcelona Bricks. Images by the author.
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 11 of 15

Figure 7. Alberto T. Estévez (Yomna K. Abdallah, computational designer), Biodigital Barcelona Bricks (3D-printed clay),
GENARQ/iBAG, UIC Barcelona. V3 design iteration of the Biodigital Barcelona Bricks showing the bricks’ varied material
density from a linear model of 0.5 cm thickness to a bulk model (a–d), with the density of the bricks varying from 25% to
55% and 75%. Images by the author.

3.2. Digital Fabrication: 3D-Printed Pixelated Architecture

Testing different digital fabrication strategies and materials aimed to test the potential
of mass production and the sustainability of material processing on the broader scale of
the construction industry. Both subtractive and additive digital fabrication methods were
tested using laser cutter, and 3D printing. The tested laser cutter method was employed to
generate contoured or stacked layers of the biodigital bricks from different types of board
wood. These layers were cut in negative and positive profiles and contoured in different
thicknesses and manipulated by varying the space between each layer and the following
from zero to an equal thickness of the used wood board as shown in Figure 8. These empty
spaces were designed to facilitate vertical gardening and to be able to host soil for growing
different plants. These stacked, contoured digital fabrication strategies also enabled per-
mutations in the grouping together of various biodigital bricks’ profiles, resulting in more
formal sophistication as well as enabling the stacking of different profiles from the same
design iteration in four different orientations (front, back, right, and left) (Figure 9).
This subtractive digital fabrication strategy proved to be easily adopted and cost-effective,
as well as opening more potentials for formal manipulation as shown in Figures 6 and 7
and being lighter in weight than the 3D-printed clay bricks. However, these wooden
stacked bricks were not the optimal sustainable solution as they needed to be glued or
joined together through a specially designed joinery system that requires more material
to be processed, and consequently more fabrication processes. Thus, the additive digital
fabrication method using 3D printing was tested next.
The 3D-printed bricks were printed in standard clay material in an ambient room
temperature. The printing process was conducted in collaboration with Noumena as shown
in Figure 8. The different 3D-printed design iterations of the biodigital bricks revealed that
the linear bricks’ model in all design iterations showed enhanced resistance to cracking.
These linear models in the three design iterations (V1, V2, V3) reached the minimum usage
of material, 50% less material, and were lighter in weight and used less printing time
than the bulk brick models in all the design iterations (Figure 10). Furthermore, the linear
models also exhibited cracking resistance in comparison to the bulk models in which some
of them suffered from cracking in certain points. Thus, the digital simulation of the bricks’
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 12 of 15

design topology and simulation were congruent with physical models’ experimentation,
achieving an optimized formal design that achieves minimum material consumption and
minimum printing time and processes.

Figure 8. Alberto T. Estévez (Yomna K. Abdallah, computational designer), Biodigital Barcelona Bricks, GENARQ/iBAG,
UIC Barcelona. The three design iterations of the Biodigital Barcelona Bricks digitally fabricated in wood using a laser
cutter. (a) The three different design iterations digitally cut in wood by a laser cutter, resulting in more design options
and providing positive and negative profiles of the brick models per each design iteration. (b) Design iteration V1 was
fabricated following the contouring strategy of the cut profiles of the brick in positive and negative profiles. (c,d) Design
iteration V2 and V3 were fabricated by contouring the model in positive and negative profiles. Photos by the authors.

Figure 9. Alberto T. Estévez (Yomna K. Abdallah, computational designer), Biodigital Barcelona Bricks (laser-cut wood),
GENARQ/iBAG, UIC Barcelona. Various design possibilities that emerged from varying the stacking or contouring
orientation of each biodigital brick design iteration.(a) The achievement of these possibilities by varying the distance
between each profile and then allowing the integration of soil or other biomaterials so as to be able to grow plants for
vertical farms or gardens by varying the orientation of each profile (from the front, back, right, and left) and by applying
permutations through combining the profiles from the three different design iterations together in one contoured brick
design, as shown in (b). Photos by the authors.
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 13 of 15

Figure 10. Alberto T. Estévez (Yomna K. Abdallah, computational designer), Biodigital Barcelona Bricks (3D-printed clay),
GENARQ/iBAG, UIC Barcelona. (a–c) show different iterations (V1, V2, and V3) printed with clay. Right: 3D printing
process of the linear model. Photos by the author.

4. Conclusions
The current work aimed to make a sustainability leap in construction and 3D-printed
architecture. This change was achieved by using both less material and fewer processes
through minimizing material consumption and material processing while maintaining
highly functional formal design. This was attained by the employment of the digital ad-
vancements in algorithm-aided design, structural simulation, and 3D printing technologies.
The algorithm-aided design enabled the physiological form-finding of the bricks’ forms
as construction pixelization. The biodigital brick followed its specific function, resulting
from the reaction–diffusion algorithm that simulated the diffusion of liquids (water) in
clay materials to specify the last zones to absorb water in clay. These points were further
optimized following the shortest path algorithm to minimize the span between each two
points to guarantee equally distributed loads and enhanced resistance to cracking. This
form-finding simulation contributed to the novelty of the proposed concept of pixelating
the architectural 3D printing and is a further step in the democratization the dominant trend
of celebrating the advancements in 3D printing tools in the construction realm. This avoids
the drawbacks of one-step printing of full-scale architecture, which does not contribute
to democratizing the practice and is the least efficient in terms of material consumption,
process, and cost. The proposed pixelation of architectural 3D printing coupled with an
optimized formal design and a minimal amount of material and processes provide greater
potential to utilize 3D printing as a sustainable tool in the architectural construction realm.
Moreover, the simulation and the 3D printing experiment proved that the linear model of
the Biodigital Barcelona Bricks iterations V1, V2, and V3 achieved optimum coherence with
50% fewer materials and less printing time, which achieved the objective of this research.
Thus, these are not only the first proposed 3D-printed, biodigital baked ceramic bricks
that were digitally designed and manufactured, but are also the first to be flexible with
multiple spatial orientations and spatial organizations. This type of brick could not have
been conceived, designed, or manufactured before the current advances in 3D printing and
form customization; it is absolutely the product of our time, of our zeitgeist.

Author Contributions: Conceptualization, A.T.E.; methodology, A.T.E. and Y.K.A.; software, A.T.E.
and Y.K.A.; validation, A.T.E. and Y.K.A.; formal analysis, A.T.E. and Y.K.A.; investigation, A.T.E.
and Y.K.A.; resources, A.T.E.; data curation, A.T.E. and Y.K.A.; writing—original draft preparation,
A.T.E. and Y.K.A.; writing—review and editing, A.T.E. and Y.K.A.; visualization A.T.E. and Y.K.A.;
supervision, A.T.E.; project administration, A.T.E.; funding acquisition, A.T.E. All authors have read
and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Funding: This research received no external funding.
Data Availability Statement: Not applicable.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Biomimetics 2021, 6, 59 14 of 15

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