With the advent of Computer-Aided Design, the design and fabrication of complex free-form shells have become easier to achieve. However, this results in extensive usage of custom-made formworks for the production of shell components and falseworks which provide support for the shell during the construction process. Therefore, a modular design method is proposed for generating form-active spatial structures out of stackable blocks of a few types, having in mind its potential applications such as housing. Instead of shells, spatial masonry structures are thus the main consideration in the design process considering building on top of a vaulted ceiling. By designing a 3D interlocking grid and introducing a four-step topological design that is coupled with structural verification processes based on finite element modelling and discrete element modelling simulations, the geometry of interlocking stackable modular blocks can be automatically generated for constructing such spatial masonry structures. The proposed method ensures that the designed vaults are modular, reconfigurable, and self-supporting during construction, thus increasing the efficiency of mass production while allowing for combinatorial mass customization in designs.

In 2018, a new standard was released for daylight in buildings: EN 17037. This is the first standard for daylight in buildings for Europe. In the Netherlands it will replace the NEN 2057. The determination method for daylight provision for EN 17037 is based on internal illuminance. Additional ambitions for the design quality factors: view, direct sunlight and the prevention of glare have been added to the standard. A sustainable design is all about balancing daylight performance and energy consumption. Large windows will cause the building to overheat and use too much cooling energy. Too small windows will result in low levels of daylight availability and visual comfort. For this reason, it was still unclear whether it is possible to achieve these new recommendations for daylight and at the same time meet the energy requirements for Green building certificates, such as BREEAM and LEED. The main aim of this research was therefore to investigate how much influence the European standard has on the energy consumption of a typical office building and whether the requirements for BREEAM and LEED can still be met.
The analysis shows that the European standard has an influence on the daylight and energy credits for BREEAM and LEED. For the daylight credits this standard has a positive influence. For the minimum performance level for daylight provision for the European standard this is not yet enough to meet the requirements for daylight provision for BREEAM and LEED. For BREEAM and LEED, the variants only meet the requirements if the medium and high recommendation levels for the European standard are met. However, the ASE is often too high for a design that meets the high performance level for EN 17037. It should also be taken into account that when a certain performance level for daylight provision has been achieved for the European standard using method 2 (based on internal illuminance per hour for a typical year) this same variant will usually score lower with method 1 (based on daylight factors).
The energy consumption goes up when the recommendation level for the European standard is higher. When comparing the average energy consumption of variants with the minimum performance level for the European norm with the high performance level, the total energy consumption goes up 8.33 kWh/m2 . These values can be higher or lower with different orientations. To reduce the negative impact of the European standard on BREEAM and LEED, certain parameters for the design can be chosen differently. The most important parameters for meeting the high-performance level and minimizing primary fossil energy consumption is the window-to-wall ratio and width/depth ratio. To find a balance between daylight and energy consumption, the optimal width/depth ratio is between 1.33 and 0.75. The optimum window-to-wall ratio is between 40% and 60%. To reduce the cooling consumption and ASE even more, designers can consider the introduction of overhangs in the façade, or other interventions that reduce the window SHGC.

This thesis concerns the application of different multi-objective optimization (MOO) methods and strategies for finding the optimal envelope for a given building plot and lighting performance indicators. More specifically, the PV potential and daylighting potential of the building are maximized using different optimization solvers. Auxilliary objectives are introduced to constrain the model to a certain compactness and size. The method utilises an existing data framework called TopoGenesis and solves the problem using the PyGmo library.

A ray tracing is used to find all possible collisions between the objective test
points and the building mass and environment. The problem is first presented as a standard integer programming problem, but solving this problem is not feasible if complexity needs to be kept at a reasonable level. An alternative method of continuous optimization is therefore proposed that uses (meta)heuristics to find an optimal solution for maximizing the objective functions. The occupation status of the massing is used as inputs for the decision variables.

After the application of this method on small scale toy problems, a few of the
design options are selected and evaluated by their performance indicators, as well as the measure with which the option makes sense from a more traditional design perspective. The comparison of the performance and results of both methods give insight into the recommended workflow, settings, and pitfalls for finding an optimal solution to a multi-criteria design problem with visibility objectives. From the initial results, the Non-Sorted Genetic Algorithm seems to be the best option for solving these types of problems, and the PV potential objective is validated. The daylighting potential objective performs less satisfactory and suggestions are made on alternative approaches for this metric.