Architextiles

Architextiles refers to a broad range of projects and approaches that combine architecture, textiles, and materials science.

[3][4][5] In Roman times, a velarium was used as an awning to cover the entire cavea, the seating area within amphitheaters, serving as a protection for the spectators against the sun.

Laser cutting, ultrasonic welding, thermoplastic setting, pultrusion, electrospinning, and other advanced textile manufacturing techniques are all included in architextiles.

Architextiles integrate various fields like architecture, textile design, engineering, physics and materials science.

[1]: 4  Textiles motivate architects with their numerous features, enabling them to express ideas via design and create environmentally conscious buildings.

Tensile surfaces composed of structural fabrics, such as canopies, roofs, and other types of shelter, are included in architectural textiles.

[11] Besides surface qualities, such as rough and smooth, dull and shiny, hard and soft, textiles also includes colour, and, as the dominating element, texture, which is the result of the construction of weaves.

Like any craft it may end in producing useful objects, or it may rise to the level of art.The essentially structural principles that relate the work of building and weaving could form the basis of a new understanding between the architect and the inventive weaver.

Over centuries, nomadic tribes in the Middle East, Africa, the Orient, and the Americas have developed textile structures.