JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #52 - October 2009 - 56

USERS’ PLATFORM Application Modelling space with composites The architect is a creative professional whose business it is to design and see to the construction of buildings. He reconciles art and science to craft artefacts in space. The plasticity and specific properties of composites can help him in his work. Here we put some questions to one such architect who uses composites to their best advantage. AN INTERVIEW WITH RAPHAËL PISTILLI, ARCHITECT, RAPHAËL PISTILLI ARCHITECTS AGENCY JEC Composites Magazine: How did you become interested in composite materials? RAPHAËL PISTILLI: As I studied for my diploma, the subject of which was “architecture and robotics”, I came into contact with fibre producers and composite processors. Composite materials are often used in the manufacture of robots on account of their lightness. What struck me most of all was the complexity of certain forms and the continuity of the material. Credit: Dominique Perron construction? What have you been able to produce with them? R. P Composite materials offer new .: technical and formal possibilities; you can create complex forms simply. They allow several constituent parts of a building to be produced from the same material, so avoiding the problems caused by the adjacency of several materials with different technical performance characteristics, such as differential expansion. One of the advantages of composites is their development in the field of environmental quality. On account of their natural thermal qualities, for equivalent performance, lesser thicknesses are required in construction, so generating energy savings in their manufacture. Our agency has succeeded in creating material continuity, obtaining extremely specific surface conditions and using the lightness of composites to create, for example, mobile elements in façades. Take the south façade of the gymnasium at Bron-Parilly (see picture): it was produced using composite materials. JCM: What are the brakes on using composites in construction and how, in your opinion, might these be removed? R. P For composites, the main problem lies .: in the regulations and requirements of the inspection authorities with regard to technical approval, or compliance with the code of practice for building and construction, since such rules do not yet exist. The manufacturing of fibre/resin shells requires us to call upon the services of specialists who do not usually work in construction and who do not always understand why the constraints are so strict when there are so few requirements in terms of the technical characteristics. More information Raphaël Pistilli, with his brother, Robert Pistilli, created the BEA Raphaël Pistilli Architects agency in November 1988. Since then, he has worked on the formal and technical integration of composite materials in his projects, and on the creation of contemporary furniture. His work has contributed to many finished projects along the way, in particular public buildings, with an emphasis on the best use of light, to craft that "little bit extra" out of the architect's remit. Choosing to use materials that are so rarely employed forces us to go so much farther with our studies, to fully understand the modes of production, and to represent the details of project execution on a broader scale. During construction, a more constant presence on site is required so that the other trades are made aware of the requirements in the use of composites. JCM: JCM: How do you envisage the future use of composites? R. P Today, and in the near future, .: composites may be used for architectonic elements, and for façade cladding in order to protect external insulation, which is going to become ever more prevalent with the new thermal regulations for buildings. Yet their development in the future will be driven by the ease with which they can be used to produce complex forms, when compared to the materials commonly used today in the building industry. Contact: bea.raphael-pistilli@wanadoo.fr Gymnasium at Bron-Parilly (France) for the Town of Bron. JCM: What do you think about the way architects are trained in these materials? R. P At the Lyons School of Architecture, .: there isn't really any training as such in materials, it's more a question of the habit of using certain traditional materials, such as concrete, wood, etc. JCM: In your opinion, what do composite materials bring into jec composites magazine / No52 October 2009

JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #52 - October 2009

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #52 - October 2009