Data Driven Shade: A Research Through Design Study Of Climate Responsive Design In Public Space

Urban heat stress, created by the combination of urbanisation and climate change, is threatening the use of urban public space, affecting inhabitants' health and well-being. Effective cooling in urban environments requires place-based cooling strategies that respond to local microclimatic conditions. The provision of shade, in the form of lightweight structures such as sails and street shelters, is a highly effective cooling strategy that can enable flexible, rapid cooling in public space. However, these shade structures are typically implemented as generic solutions despite the variability of thermal environments and requirements across urban landscapes. This implementation gap is representative of the broader challenge in cooling public space due to the lack of site-specific design and poor understanding of urban microclimates.

This thesis proposes that the context specific challenge can be addressed through a data-driven approach to design, using open-source parametric computational tools to enable climate-responsive cooling strategies. Through a Research through Design approach, combining computational simulation with physical prototyping, the research validates Ladybug Tools for shade design applications and conceptualises shade as a system, where form is produced from the definition of key parameters and interactions relating to materials, geometry and context. The resulting modular system, tested in Turin, Italy, demonstrates how the integration of microclimate data throughout the design process leads to a system that responds to place, while maintaining practical deployment and scalability across urban landscapes.

The process of designing a shade system highlighted broader implications for climate-responsive design in public spaces: the contribution of computational design tools in facilitating climate responsive design through data-based feedback, the need for post-installation feedback mechanisms to enable continued adaptation, the potential for embedding multiple data types beyond solar radiation into parametric systems, and the challenge of balancing computational optimisation with user agency. Future research should explore how the developed shade system workflow translates to other cooling interventions and investigate stronger methods of connecting physical and digital systems post installation within the practical constraints of public space.