This student thesis by Siam Rahman, a graduating architecture student of North South University, begins with a quietly radical question: Can a factory be more than a machine for production? Instead of accepting the industrial complex as a rigid, isolating institution, the project reimagines the textile factory as a living cultural landscape, one that grows, adapts, and evolves with people, technology, and time.
His project proposes an architecture where nothing is fixed or final. Spaces expand and contract, modules rearrange, and programs overlap. Work, leisure, and living no longer exist as separate zones but merge fluidly, reflecting the lived realities of weaving communities. Here, architecture behaves less like an object and more like an organism, responsive, temporal, and deeply human.
Rooted in the traditions of textile craft culture, the thesis draws inspiration from the social fabric of weaving communities, where collaboration, shared courtyards, and intergenerational knowledge transfer define everyday life. These values form the spatial DNA of the project. Open courtyards emerge as central elements of spaces for rest, conversation, dyeing, drying, and informal gathering, echoing the collective rhythms of traditional production.
The theoretical foundation of his project is equally rich. William Morris’s ideas shape the belief that meaningful work and humane environments are inseparable. Cedric Price’s notion of adaptable, time-based architecture and Constant Nieuwenhuys’s vision of an ever-evolving spatial world further inform the project’s flexibility and openness. Rather than treating craft and technology as opposites, the design positions artisans, power-loom operators, and automated systems as interconnected parts of the same cultural continuum.
The design process itself breaks convention. Instead of starting with form, it begins with behaviour, theory, and environmental logic. Modular units are developed as living cells, capable of endless recombination. Over a thousand iterations are tested, allowing courtyards to emerge as climatic and social voids naturally.
Environmental performance plays a critical role. Using Ladybug radiation analysis, each configuration is evaluated for heat gain and thermal comfort essential for large industrial spaces. From these simulations, twenty-five low-radiation options are shortlisted. But climate data alone does not define success.
To understand how people truly inhabit the factory, AI-driven virtual agents are introduced using Unreal Engine. These agents simulate the daily routines of weavers, machine operators, and automation supervisors working, resting, socialising, and commuting. Their movements reveal patterns of interaction, spatial efficiency, and the social importance of courtyards as communal condensers.
Through layered evaluation of social interaction, program usage, and spatial occupancy, Iteration 542 emerges as the optimal configuration. Balanced between production zones and living clusters, the factory creates a gradient that mirrors the rhythm of human life.
Ultimately, in this thesis, Siam Rahman proposes a future factory that strengthens our culture. It is a place where architecture supports coexistence, where technology amplifies humanity, and where industrial space becomes a framework for collective life.
