Proposing Intelligent Façade Pattern Inspired by Living Creature’s Structure Toward an Energy-Efficient Facade

Nowadays, façades are more than just the face of a building. Apart from its role in defining identity and provide a general picture of a building, they are also the brain of it which is to a great extent responsible for both energy efficiency and user comfort. Recently, to answer these demands, the complexity of designing a façade has reached such a degree that it is possible to talk about ‘Intelligent Façades.’ An intelligent façade is a skin that self-adjusts, with an active or passive method, to changes produced by its surrounding or interior. Answering how to respond efficiently to environmental changes by an intelligent façade is a great challenge. However, it seems that since nature is providing high quality but simple solutions for maximum achievement and due to its tendency to develop itself to meet the demands of its existing surrounding, the focus on bionic solutions shall lead new perspectives and innovative solutions for such façades.
In this paper, an innovative response is posited to these issues by reviewing similar case studies in bio-inspired building skins and analyzing the demands of an intelligent façade. Consequently, by several bionic patterns that are chosen from nature and especially from the plants which can respond to varying conditions and appropriately adjust itself, with providing energy efficiency, user comfort, and aesthetic aspects, a new alternative is put forward for designing an intelligent façade. In this stage by applying an energy stimulating tool to the pattern, it could be claimed that this pattern would respond to the different light condition of a façade efficiently.