Fungi-based materials (myco-materials) have been celebrated and experimented with for their architectural and structural potential for over a decade. This paper describes research applied to assembly strategies for growing large building units and assembling them into efficiently formed wall prototypes. A major concern in the development of these two fabrication strategies is to design re-usable formwork systems. La Parete Fungina demonstrates two undulating wall units standing side-by-side, each composed of seventeen myco-welded slabs. L’Orso Fungino revisits the in situ monolithic fabric forming of units that are repeated, stacked, and post-tensioned. Although the design and research presented in this paper focuses on overcoming the challenges of growing large-scale building components, this work also touches on issues of accessibility and technology, economic and logistical systems needed for building-scale applications, and material ethics of energy and waste associated with emerging biomaterial production.

This paper describes novel computational design, simulation, and fabrication techniques employed in the production of a large sound-absorbing sculpture called Phoenix, made entirely from mycelium-composite materials (myco-materials). Myco-materials are composites made of lignocellulosic agricultural waste fibers bound by fungal mycelium and are produced at commercial scale as alternatives for plastics, insulation foam, or styrene. Mycelium composite materials have known acoustical properties that can be tuned according to variables such as growing time, substrate type, substrate size, and density. The fabrication method for producing the Phoenix sculpture revisits how we build performative and formal complexity in the most economic and sustainable way. The results indicate the potential for grown materials to be used in retrofit projects, allowing rooms to be customized in various acoustical situations, such as music or speech.

The need to control how sound travels within a room, or how sound is transmitted from one room to another room, has necessitated a commercial industry that manufactures sound absorbing panels and sound transmission reduction products. The design of acoustic treatments targets high acoustic absorption or high transmission loss, respectively. However, many of the present-day treatments available include materials that do not meet current sustainability demands (i.e., petrochemical foam, hard Styrofoam, and molded plastic). This paper investigates sustainable options for acoustic products and seeks to quantify the acoustic absorption and transmission loss of “myco-materials,” a composite of lignocellulosic fibers bound together by fungal mycelium. These myco-materials were tested in an impedance tube under various conditions, including several modifications to the myco-material specimens that sought to alter the acoustic properties. The impedance tube tests show that myco-materials show moderate acoustic absorption and transmission loss. Myco-materials have potential for future research into improving both absorptive and transmission loss properties, they are relevant for diffuse surfaces in architectural acoustic applications.