Call D.A.N.I. (Decentralised Autonomous Nomadic Infrastructure)

RESEARCH BACKGROUND: Patrick Macasaet, through his architectural studio ‘Superscale’ received an Honourable Mention, by Non Architecture for their speculative project on Droneports as Decentralised Autonomous Nomadic Infrastructures. RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION: Call D.A.N.I. is a speculative proposition, designed through game engines, on the emerging typology of droneports situated in Hong Kong. The project speculates on droneports as Decentralised Autonomous Nomadic Infrastructures that capitalises on social media’s community-led journalism and reporting to facilitate rapid emergency response team. Consisting of modular structures, each port varies based on site conditions. It simultaneously acts as new forms of simultaneous emergency and civic infrastructures. The work investigates Macasaet and Tan’s ongoing research on gaming technologies, ideation and processes through gaming and its application for architectural pedagogy, speculation and practice. RESEARCH SIGNIFICANCE: Non Architecture seeks to reinvent spatial design by questioning the base, the fundaments and the conventions of an architect’s work. With its international editorial team and a design community of thousands of people, it develops initiatives, mediums, and projects to explore innovative design solutions and experimental collaboration models. The competitions aim to explore unconventional and uncharted design solutions within the realm of architecture, urban planning and design. During its 6 years in action, it has run 21 competitions, engaged around 8000 participants in 183 countries, accumulated over 3000 design ideas and released curated content in 19 books. Superscale’s research-based proposal – realised as a competition entry - was not only an opportunity to explore speculative research for new emerging typologies and design processes through gaming technologies, but was also seen alongside their contemporaries in a significant international architectural competition context.