Open Collections

Krahn, Nicholas

Since the development of the space program, we as a species have experienced environments beyond Earth. We’ve seen astronauts standing on unfamiliar terrain while looking back at our home planet. From this point on access to the solar system had been opened, only leaving time and will to decide when humans would journey further. More than half a century has passed since the first moonwalk, yet NASA is only now attempting to travel back to the moon. Private entities have begun to fill this gap, pushing humanity to begin the future. This highly fictional fantasy is seemingly being forced into reality by several dreamers. While NASA has developed the Artemis program, Space X has developed Starship. A launch vehicle capable of bringing humans to the red planet and beyond. With such forceful innovation in the field of rocketry the possibility of Martian settlement seems all but certain, opening an entirely new realm of possibilities within the fields of engineering and architecture. Although if architects don’t quickly accept and engage in this field, the consequences to themselves could become dire. Because Mars is so far away, communication quickly becomes a problem, with delays of up to 46 minutes. This all but forces construction to be automated using robotics. Additionally, resources are not readily available on Mars, they need to be mined and processed to extract the materials needed for construction. The combination of these two problems means that a lightweight, robotically operable material is needed to construct the initial structures on the planet. Fabrics are the prime choices for this task as they are flexible and lightweight. Lessons can be learned through the long history of textile architecture on Earth and be applied using a similar method on Mars. Historical, Modern, and Robotic methods have been researched to further determine what sticks and what does not. The lightweight, flexible, manipulable nature of fabrics combine to create a design approach that best suits the Martian environment. As nomadic peoples have moved and survived in the harshest environments on Earth using fabrics, so should humans on mars.

Text

University of British Columbia. ARCH 549

Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library

10.14288/1.0432048

Applied Science, Faculty of; Architecture and Landscape Architecture (SALA), School of

Unreviewed

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/