ARCHITECTURAL ASSOCIATION LONDON

Unit 8 was taught by Tom Svilans, Greg Storrar and Dave Reeves. Unit 8 explored the world of digital modelling and immersive technology. Ideas of virtual reality as a creative and critical medium were introduced as a way to expose and spatialize hidden phenomena in the city of London. Students looked for conditions of eccentricity or immaterial phenomena through individual explorations of the city - sites of change, invisible energies, paths of motion, qualities of space. These became the seeds of their invented "False Cities" which sought to embody and clarify these ideas, and which were experienced and explored through the electronic eyes of VR headsets. Above all, the Unit was concerned with questioning the role of virtual reality for designers today, as an active and speculative tool, and how it could be deployed in new, surprising, and productive ways.