Sustainable innovation in Minimal Mass Structures and Lightweight Architectures

The special issue Sustainable innovation in Minimal Mass Structures and Lightweight Architectures of the Journal of Architectural Engineering and Design Management selects the most significant topics that were at the center of the discussion during the international symposium "Softening the habitats" organized by the Politecnico di Milano and the Association European TensiNet. The key questions that today are driving research and development in the field of lightweight membrane constructions and textile architecture are the following two. In the light of consolidated technological level and the renewed design-manufacturing tools, what innovation can we still expect? And what disruptive changes will make this area more and more coherently aligned with the environmental sustainability objectives of the entire construction? The two volumes of this special issue offer answers to the above questions, and help to bring the spotlight to a construction’s niche, which has always operated according to the principles of mass minimization and efficiency maximization that are today widely rediscovered and enhanced in terms of green economy. The first volume looks to the distant future of textile architecture, focusing on the experimental works that want to overcome the current technologies, discovering new materials, new weaving and knitting techniques, and envisioning novel structural concepts and installation procedures, as well as unusual hybridizations between technical textiles and other lightweight materials. The second volume looks to the near future of membrane structures - that is to the production techniques and those materials today considered the most reliable and durable in the field of tensile structures – and, from this priveleged observatory, it focuses on incremental innovation approaches, on best practices for enhancing environmental sustainability, comfort, thermal, acoustic and light efficiency, as well as on the ways of assessing their impact on our common planet.