The Kuwait Fund for Advanced Science’s Conference Centre aims to serve as a beacon for Kuwait and the world, leading the scientific community by example and opening the doors to scientific research to the general public. This is the underlying pillar to which all aspects of the presented design have been developed; not only through the physical and morphological representation, but also through the applied concepts and strategies through which the presented design has been developed.

The algorithmic translation of biological evolutionary principles and its computational application for the design’s conceptual development has served as the primary approach for the design of the the conference centre. Through the application of this model, a highly adaptable system that is easily modifiable, yet highly robust, to generate a design solution that has been optimised for the environmental factors that are unique to the site’s location and surroundings has been developed. Through this approach, and in the context of generating an interplay between solid and void, the design was centred around an external atrium that ‘opened’ the building towards the sea, which in turn creates a protected open space that can be used throughout the day all around the year.

The building’s façade was translated into a highly compact point cloud, onto which the solar analysis was conducted. The conference centre’s morphological characteristics demanded a solution that complimented the designs large foot print and horizontality. As such, the results from the point cloud analysis dictated the location of horizontal louvres that wrap around the facades of the design that are most directly affected by solar gain, allowing for a contrast between the complete transparency of some facades, and the horizontal louvre divisions on the others. Moreover, the louvres solar response allowed the design to differentiate into distinct forms, each with its own characteristics yet harmoniously unified into one.