Contributions from the research institutions Bartlett School of Architecture / University College London, Harvard University, Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia, Institute for Computational Design / University of Stuttgart, Institute of Technology in Architecture / ETH Zurich, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Princeton University, Yale University, and conversations between Mario Carpo and Matthias Kohler, Neil Gershenfeld and Mark Burry, Achim Menges and Philip Beesley, Virginia San Fratello, Ronald Rael and Neri Oxman

Following the inaugural FABRICATE Conference 2011 in London, the most important forum for international discussion on digital fabrication in architecture has resumed by Fabio Gramazio and Matthias Kohler at ETH Zurich. In contrast to the projects presented in 2011 at the Bartlett School of Architecture, which were balanced between practice and research, the questions about design and materialisation in architecture, construction, engineering, manufacturing, material and software design currently seem to be driven more by research institutions and young start-up entrepreneurs than by architectural practice. While digital fabrication technologies are becoming common practice in architecture for prototyping as well as in the real- isation of buildings, contemporary research does not just investigate their further development, but presents ways to integrate them already in an early design phase – to definitely overcome the still prevalent separation of design and making.

In der Publikation werden aktuelle Arbeiten und herausragende Projekte im Bereich der digitalen Fabrikation vorgestellt und durch Gespräche unter Wissenschaftlern aus Forschung und Praxis ergänzt. Das Buch begleitet die FABRICATE Konferenz, die im Februar 2014 an der ETH in Zürich durchgeführt wird.