The age of industry 4.0 promises to lead way to a new age of connectivity between matter and information, changing not only the way we design but also how we build.

Advancements of digital design tools have drastically changed the AEC industry in recent years and have led to new movements reshaping our future cities. However, as ‘starchitect’ projects are springing up worldwide and filling up front pages, the mainstream construction world has remained barely untouched in the last 50 years, comprising of manual labour and low tech methods.

As more and more repetitive boxes are filling up our skylines, the key to solving the missing link between advanced fabrication and digital design has to do with the democratisation of data and interdisciplinary integration.

The digital revolution we have started can not remain a software feature but must evolve to inherently change the building itself as an end product.

So how can we use AI algorithms, robotics and use new technologies to bring down costs of advanced manufacturing, create iconic architectural designs and improve energy efficiency of buildings? It is time to re-examine our very basic axioms of construction and blur the boundaries between the designer, the software and the machine.