- Sign in | Subscribe
  Log in
  Sign in
  
  Help
  
  Sign in
  
  If you’ve activated your online subscription to the AJ or you already have an account for the AJ Buildings Library, sign in below.
  
  Email address:
  
  Password:
  
  Remember me
  
  Forgotten password? | Subscribe now
  
  By continuing to use the site you agree to our Privacy & Cookies policy
  
  AJ Subscribers
  
  The AJ Buildings Library is available as a subscription benefit to AJ subscribers. If you’ve activated your online subscription on TheAJ.co.uk, you can use the same credentials to sign in on AJBL.
  If you have not activated your subscription on the AJ website you will need to do so to access the AJ Buildings Library.
  
  Not an Architects' Journal subscriber?
  Choose one of these options:
  Subscribe today for immediate access to AJ Buildings Library, TheAJ.co.uk and The Architects’ Journal magazine.
  
  Find out more about all the benefits of a subscription to The Architects' Journal.
  
  For all queries regarding access to AJ online, please email our Online Help Desk at customerservices@ArchitectsJournal.co.uk

Email address:
Password:
	Remember me

Balls!

Alma-nac with Ruairi Glynn, London, 2013

Subscribe now to instantly view this image

Subscribe to the Architects’ Journal (AJ) for instant access to the AJ Buildings Library, an online database of nearly 2,000 exemplar buildings in photographs, plans, elevations and details.

Already a subscriber? Sign in

153_02A.jpg

Download Original

Balls! is a data-responsive, kinetic intervention, driven by bespoke open-source software

Delivered as a response to Arup’s competition: The future of the Built Environment, Balls! is an open source, data-responsive intervention exploring the changing relationship of control between buildings and their inhabitants.

Balls! is an array of 42 suspended glowing spheres, each robotically controlled by a piece of bespoke software that could convert any form of input data into movement, colour and form.

For the first half of the installation, the balls responded to sound/vibration within the building, providing a legible measure of the activity levels of its occupants.

For the latter fortnight, curation of the installation was handed over to the building’s users, allowing the project to evolve into a more direct feedback between the inhabitants and their environment.

The balls were programmed to react to energy use; to play a game on; to display comfort levels; anything that could be translated into sound, colour and form could be displayed.