ABSTRACT
Over the past decade we have seen an increasing interest in exploring the capacity of built spaces to change, i.e. to respond dynamically—and automatically—to changes in the external and internal environments and to different patterns of use. The principal idea is that two-way relationships could be established among the spaces, the environment, and the users: the users or the changes in the environment would affect the configuration of space and vice versa; the result is an architecture that self-adjusts to the needs of the users. Different terms have been used to describe such architecture: adaptive, dynamic, transformable, interactive, responsive, etc. As I will argue in this chapter, the principal idea behind it—facilitating and accommodating change—is not new; what has changed are the technologies (and materials) to accomplish it.
