Courtyard Kit

The question

How can movable pieces fill a terrace without fixing it to a single layout?

The brief

Courtyard Kit combines seating, planting, tables and pergolas into whole pieces that can move and rotate. The current Freeform study uses seven shapes, each covering four cells of a two-metre grid. Each cell begins with the full set of parts, so seating and planting can appear throughout the terrace.

The method

Paired connectors keep each four-cell shape intact. Finished outer edges can meet the terrace boundary. Monoceros fills the area; the designers create the parts, revise the brief and evaluate the resulting space.

The result

The documented default fills an 8 × 8-cell area with 16 whole pieces. Tests using 25 seeds produced 25 distinct layouts, with checks for complete coverage, intact pieces, boundary rules and repeatability. These findings apply to the tested version and scope of the study.

Further development

The connection rules do not establish circulation, accessibility or structural performance; these need further assessment. The pergolas and the relationship between each shape and its function also remain in development.

Design and critique: Ján Pernecký and Hugo Fekar. The Monoceros definition and rendering were developed with AI-assisted scripts. Images show the generated geometry.