How you can make the most of the Metaverse in the Architecture Scene?

The Metaverse is largely built on video-game engines, as a lot of the tools that power these digital environments have been used by game designers for decades (see Decentraland, The Sandbox or Cryptovoxels). These simulated environments allow for a spectrum of activities to take place, ranging from work to play and even e-commerce. If we are to spend increasing amounts of our time navigating through digital environments through augmented reality glasses or VR headsets, who should design these spaces and where does the architect’s role in this vision of the future lie?

One of the benefits of the Metaverse is that it is not beholden to the laws, regulations or the very notion of gravity that governs our projects in the built environment. Often, these spaces are designed and coded by users or developers with little formal design experience. The comparable digital regulations are enforced by the designers of any given platform through its gaming code, which often results in a pixelated, blurry aesthetic that conjures up a certain nostalgia for earlier tech. While this space for play, exploration and the democratization of the designer should absolutely exist, how can the architecture and design community simultaneously harness the Metaverse to design more intelligently in the real world?

As creators with a firm grasp of the digital tools required to build complex and innovative projects, architects are uniquely qualified to engage with the design of the Metaverse. Typically, throughout the different stages of a project, architects produce a series of visualizations as the design develops to help communicate its intent. With the influx of newer technologies and design tools, these visualizations have evolved from static imagery to animations, immersive 360° renderings and even live simulations that allow a potential client to inhabit a project. It’s no surprise then, that global firms such as Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) and Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG), and even some major cities have begun to make major inroads into Metaverse design.

If uploaded to the Metaverse, a project can be used to simulate real experiences, empowering both the designer and client with important data surrounding its experience. The company Buildmedia has even gone as far as building a complete digital twin of the city of Wellington, New Zealand, creating a platform for its citizens to better engage with urban data.

The pairing of digital replicas with physical environments or products also allows companies to run simulations using real-life scenarios before making costly decisions. So far, the biggest institutional adoption of the Metaverse and the digital twin has been from the art, shopping and entertainment industries; however, there are countless opportunities for the AEC industry. Whether optimizing the design of a retail environment to effectively situate products or maximizing the energy efficiency of a building, digital twins can have real world benefit outside of the Metaverse.

Another element of the Metaverse that has been rightly criticized is the large carbon footprint required to power the data centers it relies on. While this is a fundamental issue not only affecting the Metaverse, if more projects with real world applications are brought into this space, resulting energy efficiencies in the built environment will certainly help. Being able to build realistic virtual counterparts of buildings to simulate their environmental and experiential conditions could benefit scientific research and innovation.

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