The proliferation of digital technologies considerably changed the field of architecture. Digital fabrication pushes architecture into an unexpected new domain of previously unachievable complexity, detail, and materiality. Understanding these technologies’ impact can help direct future research, innovate design and construction processes, and improve the education of future professionals. However, comprehensive reviews offering a holistic perspective on the effects of 3D printing technologies on architecture are limited. Therefore, this study aims to provide a systematic review of state-of-the-art research on 3D printing technologies in architectural design and construction. The review was performed using three major databases, and selected peer-reviewed journal articles published in the last ten-year period were included in quantitative and qualitative analyses. Using bibliometric analysis, the research progress is summarized through the identified trend of the annual number of articles, prominent authors and co-authorship network, and key topics in the literature organized in three clusters. Further, content analysis of selected articles enabled coding cluster themes. Moreover, the analysis differentiated two categories of 3D printing technologies based on the scale of the system, elaborating their peculiarities in terms of materials, methods, and applications. Finally, challenges and promising directions for future work and research challenges are discussed.

The goal of this research is to show potentials of vegetation walls in order to decrease temperature of façade surfaces of buildings during summer. Decreasing these temperatures directly affects coefficient of thermal conductivity of façade elements. The use of vegetation walls in architecture has opened up new possibilities for reducing energy needed for cooling during summer months when the experiment was performed. The research shows the design of a concrete prefabricated, modular model of a vegetation wall which contains plants and its impact on the temperature balance in the building envelope. It is noticeable that vegetative walls covered by plants play an important role in the harmonization of the parameters of the microclimate in relation to the local environment. Methodology presented in this paper was based on analysis of climate characteristics, experimental measurements of the test model and comparative analysis with the reference wall. During the experiment, the data about external climate parameters and the coefficient of heat transfer through the wall were continuously measured. Also, in order to examine the effect of plant species on the temperature parameters of the green wall, temperature of the wall with different plant species was measured. Data analysis enabled the assessment of the efficiency of thermal insulation of the vegetation wall in the summer period. The distribution of temperature values seen on thermograms of the experimental model showed a fall in temperature in regard to the reference wall, which leads to a decrease in the total energy required for cooling inside the building. Methodology presented in this paper allows quantitative analysis of the effects of vertical greenery.

This paper investigates the use of parametric inverted chain models (ICMs) as pedagogical tools for teaching structural design to architecture students. A mixed-methods action research study was conducted at the University of Belgrade Faculty of Architecture through a five-week educational intervention with 30 undergraduate students, integrating analog and digital form-finding within a learning-by-doing framework. The intervention combined physical hanging-chain models with computational simulations using Spider3D, a custom Grasshopper plugin developed for ICM simulation. Data collected through surveys, knowledge assessments, focus-group discussions, reflective journals, and instructor observations indicate that the approach improved students’ understanding of structural behavior, equilibrium forms, and the relationship between form and force. Participants reported increased confidence in structural reasoning, greater engagement with structural design concepts, and a stronger appreciation of structure as a generator of architectural form. Combining physical and computational workflows enabled students to develop both intuitive and analytical perspectives on structural performance. The study suggests that parametric ICMs can function not only as form-finding tools but also as effective pedagogical instruments that support experiential learning, structural intuition, and creative exploration. The findings highlight the potential of integrating research-led digital tools into architectural education to strengthen connections among structural design, computation, and creative practice.

This paper investigates the use of parametric inverted chain models (ICMs) as pedagogical tools for teaching structural design to architecture students. A mixed-method action research study was conducted at the University of Belgrade – Faculty of Architecture through an educational intervention that integrated analog and digital form-finding within a learning-by-doing framework. The intervention combined physical hanging-chain models with computational simulations using Spider3D, a custom Grasshopper plugin developed for ICM simulation. Data collected through surveys, knowledge assessments, focus-group discussions, reflective journals, and instructor observations indicate that the approach improved students’ understanding of structural behavior, equilibrium forms, and the relationship between form and force. Participants reported increased confidence in structural reasoning, greater engagement with structural design concepts, and a stronger appreciation of structure as a generator of architectural form. The combination of physical and computational workflows enabled students to develop both intuitive and analytical perspectives on structural performance. The study demonstrates that parametric ICMs can function not only as form-finding tools but also as effective pedagogical instruments that support experiential learning, structural intuition, and creative exploration. The findings highlight the potential of integrating research-led digital tools into architectural education to strengthen the connection between structural design, computation, and creative practice.