Cyclopean Cannibalism. A method for recycling rubble

摘要

Each year, the United States discards 375 million tons of concrete construction debris to landfills (U.S. EPA 2016), but this is a new paradigm. Past civilizations cannibalized their constructions to produce new architectures (Hopkins 2005). This paper interrogates one cannibalistic methodology from the past known as cyclopean masonry in order to translate this valuable method into a contemporary digital procedure. The work contextualizes the techniques of this method and situates them into procedural recipes which can be applied in contemporary construction. A full-scale prototype is produced utilizing the described method; demolition debris is gathered, scanned, and processed through an algorithmic workflow. Each rubble unit is then minimally carved by a robotic arm and set to compose a new architecture from discarded rubble debris. The prototype merges ancient construction thinking with digital design and fabrication methodologies. It poses material cannibalism as a means of combating excessive construction waste generation.