A Blend of Different Tastes: The Language of Coffeemakers

February 15, 2021 Jeremiah Hendren

A Blend of Different Tastes: The Language of Coffeemakers

Agarwal, Manish, and Jonathan Cagan*
Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design 25, no. 2 (1998): 205-226
https://doi.org/10.1068/b250205

* Professor at Carnegie Mellon

Although there exist many different brands of coffeemakers, and much variety even with a given brand, most coffeemakers function based on a single procedure: water is first poured into and stored within a container; it then flows through a heating element, turns to steam, and rises through a tube where, at the top, it expands, condenses, and flows into a filter. [...] Even with these requirements on function and form topology, the market has demanded and supported a wide variety of coffeemakers, from the simple to the sleek. [...] In this paper we propose that shape grammars, whose application has been mostly within the field of architecture, are ideal for modeling such classes of consumer products. Within shape grammars, products can be partitioned into different topological regions which are often built around a given shape [for example, in the grammar of the Frank Lloyd Wright prairie houses [...] the houses are built off the fireplace].

Manish Agarwal & Jonathan Cagan

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