For two weeks before Christmas, UK architectural practice Hulme Chadwick and Partners moved their design office to the Design Centre. In an exhibition organized by Andrew Chadwick and Nicholas Courts for the Royal Institute of British Architects (head of practice Andrew Chadwick is also chairman of the RIBA Computer Group) and the Society of Industrial Artists and Designers, the architects went on designing almost as normal while demonstrating to the 600+ visitors how computers can be used in a professional design office.
Kit on show ranged from the RIBA 's own TI energy calculator (ยฃI00-ยฃ500), through a Superbrain micro plus Olympia printer (ยฃ2000-ยฃ6500) used amongst other things for rudimentary 3D, to the practice's ยฃ69 000 CalComp IGS500 drafting system.
Hulme Chadwick have been using the two-workstation system for almost two years; it has also formed the basis for their associated bureau, CCD. The CalComp was selected, according to Andrew Chadwick, for the joystick controlled pan and zoom on its raster displays. Also on show was the ]ones Cassidy Mellor thermal analysis program TAS ยฐ. Developed at CranfieM Institute of Technology, it runs on a Tektronix work.station connected to a Cranfield minicomputer.
TAS ยฐ simulates the thermal behaviour of buildings and produces graphs and tables of daily energy consuption and internal conditions of any building type. It can examine condensation, cost-effectiveness of Iow~nergy buildings, passive solar benefits, summer overheating avoidance and establish priorities for energy conservation investment. (Hulme Chadwick and Partners,