What does HIL sound like?

Buildings are typically documented through drawings, photographs and plans. But what does a building actually sound like? Two input projects explore the acoustic qualities of HIL: «Acoustical Archive» documents its current soundscape ahead of the renovation, while «HIL Future Soundscapes» develops a web-based acoustic design tool that enables sound to be integrated into the architectural design process from an early stage.

Acoustical Archive

Led by researcher Achilleas Xydis, the input project «Acoustical Archive» documents the acoustic heritage of the building as part of Living Lab HIL ahead of its upcoming renovation. To this end, two complementary measurement methods are used in lecture halls, offices, corridors and workshops.

Impulse response measurements quantify a room’s objective acoustic performance, providing information about its reverberation time, clarity, speech transmission index and other acoustic parameters.

Ambisonic recordings capture the everyday soundscape of the rooms at different times of day and throughout the academic calendar. Combined with 360° video recordings, they preserve the atmosphere of each moment as an immersive, explorable memory.

The resulting data constitute a detailed auditory archive that reflects the building’s dynamic acoustic identity. Room acoustics shape how we concentrate, communicate and feel in a space, often without us noticing the increased cognitive load imposed by poor acoustic conditions.

As the HIL building prepares for renovation, this archive preserves a dimension of its identity that plans and photographs alone cannot capture. It also provides planners with tangible examples of both desirable and undesirable acoustic conditions to inform future design decisions.

The input project is linked to the Architectural Acoustics course in the Department of Architecture and to the Virtual Acoustic Ecologies seminar week series, which introduces students to methods and tools for exploring the acoustic qualities of architectural spaces.

Visit the «Acoustical Archive» input project page.

Future Soundscapes HIL

While the «Acoustical Archive» documents the current sound of HIL, «HIL Future Soundscapes» looks to the future. As part of his doctoral research project, Taha Bouizargan is developing the web-based design tool «Sound is blue» that makes it possible to explore and experience acoustic aspects at an early stage of the architectural design process.

The platform not only simulates the acoustic properties of a space, but also adds typical sounds from its intended context of use. In an office, for example, these might include keyboard typing, conversations or ventilation noise. This allows designers to hear how a planned space could sound once it is in use.

HIL serves as a testing ground for the project. For selected design stages, the research team creates acoustic simulations and contextualised soundscapes. It then investigates how these listening experiences influence the decisions of the planning team. The project accompanies the design process on an ongoing basis and is also integrated into research and teaching formats at D-ARCH.

Visit the HIL Future Soundscapes input project page.