Serge Ferrari Declares Membranes a "7TH MATERIAL" for Building Skins

Cooling demand in a simulated Lyon office fell from 60.2 to 29.8 kWh/m²/year when automated external solar shading was added to Type D glazing — while heating demand rose from 11.4 to 13.4 kWh/m²/year. Serge Ferrari Architecture cites that 39.59% drop in combined demand as evidence for its core argument: more material does not mean better performance.

The company recently revealed the 7TH MATERIAL, a category currently centered on technical membrane. The framing shifts the question from how much material a building contains to what a surface can do: filter light, modulate solar gain, guide airflow, treat sound, or combine several functions at once. Membranes do not replace concrete, metal, stone, or glass. They complement them.

What does 'more with less' mean in practice?

Nic Goldsmith, Founding Director of the Lightweight Structures Group at TYLin and author of Mass to Membrane, described the history of architecture at the reveal as "one long attempt to do more with less." He traced a long shift from massive structures toward lighter ways of enclosing space, a process he says is still unfolding. As he put it: "We may not know the precise form future membranes will take. The direction is clear."

The Camp in Aix-en-Provence shows the logic at full scale. Corinne Vezzoni & Associés designed the 11,000-square-meter campus with roughly 7,000 square meters of membrane covering circulation areas that remain open to the air. The surface filters daylight, and its double curvature contributes to roof stability, air circulation, and rainwater collection. Under the project's fire safety approval, the configuration eliminated mechanical ventilation and smoke extraction within that volume.

How does climate shape the form?

At Hazza Bin Zayed Stadium in Al Ain, BDP Pattern started from a hot, dry climate rather than rain protection. The sun's path set the geometry: a 40-meter cantilever on the west side shades the field and stands at 4:00 p.m. on game days, while a porous façade lets air circulate through the envelope. The team built a full-scale prototype on site using three geometries and cut the number of panel types from 320 to 86, making local manufacturing affordable.

Architect and computational designer Nick Tyrer stated the principle directly: "Do not specify the material to fit a form you have already decided on. Let the material and the geometry find the form together, in response to the actual conditions of that place." Across projects facing a headwind, a desert sun, and a coastline, Tyrer repeats the point: "You don't specify it. You design with it."

A technical data sheet, Serge Ferrari notes, describes a product under specific test conditions. Design teams still need to understand how those properties behave within a particular configuration — while the geometry can still be adjusted.

What enters the comparison?

Serge Ferrari uses the term performance density to describe comparisons that begin with equivalent functions rather than equivalent quantities of material. The equation can include:

• Shading, daylighting, and acoustic treatment
• Structural requirements
• Carbon emissions
• Additional systems needed over time, including replacements
• What a solution makes unnecessary — extra layers, heavier structures, greater mechanical capacity

No single standardized metric yet combines all these variables. The Lyon simulation reinforces that caution: its results apply to one specific configuration, so performance figures must be read against the conditions that produced them.

Why does timing matter?

The 7TH MATERIAL methodology under development extends assessment beyond day-one installation to the materials and carbon mobilized across the entire analyzed period — installation, operation, maintenance, and replacement.

For specifiers, the consequence is sequencing: material decisions must happen earlier in design, while form, geometry, and system relationships can still change. Weight, light transmission, and resistance only gain meaning in context — supports, adjacent layers, climate, use, and maintenance. Resisting the wolf's breath works in a fairy tale. In architecture, solidity is one variable among many.