Quang Truong (Anna Shakotko)
BY BRIAN LIBBY
Architect Quang Truong has long been one of my favorite design thinkers in Portland. And that's before he wrote the world's first book about composite materials in architecture, became a Portland State University professor, and founded a software company to visualize complex zoning codes.
Raised in the Portland area, Truong originally came here with his family as a Vietnamese refugee. After receiving an undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College in studio art and engineering, he moved on to Yale University for a master's degree in architecture.
From there, Truong worked for a succession of the world's most acclaimed architects. After interning with Studio Rick Joy in Arizona, then Steven Holl Architects in New York, his first job was with Pritzker Prize winner Richard Meier. Truong later spent five years as a lead architect and project manager with another superstar firm, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, during which time the firm produced landmarks like the Broad museum in Los Angeles and began a redesign of New York's iconic Museum of Modern Art. (The year before Truong joined, DS+R had just overseen renovation of Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center, designed by Portland's greatest architect: Pietro Belluschi.)
Returning to Oregon in 2015, he worked for three years at Portland's Lever Architecture before setting out on his own. Truong won a Van Evera Bailey Fellowship from the Architecture Foundation of Oregon, which enabled him to begin studying carbon fiber and composite materials in earnest. His research included the development of a chair built from composite materials, and ultimately led to his 2020 book Composite Architecture: Building and Design with Carbon Fiber and FRPs, published by Birkhauser.
Cover of Truong's book, published in 2020 (Birkhauser)
Most recently, Truong co-founded Polytechnica, the technology company behind UrbanForm, a data-driven architecture and urban planning platform that integrates GIS and BIM technologies improve access to regulatory information, construction technology, and development opportunities by generating urban analytic models for policy and planning purposes.
Recently I talked with Truong to learn more about all these things: composite materials, zoning, education, mass timber.
PORTLAND ARCHITECTURE: In the book, you talk about developing an interest in composite materials and FRPs from an early age, as it showed up in a range of non-architectural designed objects. Was it tennis rackets that first caught your attention?
QUANG TRUONG: Oh yeah, and I still remember that tennis racket—it was a Prince Spectrum Comp. Back then, I guess, a composite racket was still novel enough that you would even put 'Comp' in the name. It was my first 'serious' racket and it meant so much to me at the time to be given something that was so expensive when my family was so poor. But it also just shows my age, that I grew up at a time when I had familiarity with all the different kinds of materials used for tennis rackets.
You had wooden ones lying around that nobody wanted anymore, and you played with those if you showed up to lessons and didn't have anything else, like me. But you also had metal ones that most other junior rackets were made of (and still are). And those rackets were always misshapen due to abuse from other kids. I think you really get a sense of the properties of materials when you're holding them and swinging them at a ball hundreds of times a day. I remember how heavy and flexible the wooden ones were, how relatively light and stiff the metal ones were.
The composite rackets, which of course are now the only material used for tennis rackets, were, by comparison, essentially magic. They were just so much lighter and stronger. You hit a ball with one and the ball just goes much, much farther. Not only that, but I realized simply by looking at the design that they represented a different technology. The wood ones were obviously made by somebody laminating cut sheets of wood together. The metal ones were just metal tubes bent into a shape. But the composite ones were seamless, had no joints, with varying profiles and widths and all sorts of shaped designs. I remember looking at them and having no idea how they were made. At least looking back, tennis was my first tactile and design experience with material technology.
A 1990 Prince advertisement (Tennis Warehouse)
You also write about how the development in plastics during the mid-20th century was a turning point for the production of other types of polymers and composite materials. Obviously materials like carbon fiber and Kevlar are not plastic, but is it true that they are its descendants? In the book you talk about polymer resin being the “matrix” of composites, binding with fibers and additives. Is that right?
Oh the nomenclature thing is so complicated—I actually generated a number of charts and diagrams just to try and organize and track all the names and distinctions in my book. Doubly confusing is that like all words, even for technical terms, the meanings shift and change over time. In principle, you are right that composites are generally are fibers and matrices (or binders). I actually had a good conversation with a composite engineer at a conference a while back, and he lamented the name "composite," because it was so general as to be confusing.
Basically, composite means any mix of two or more materials to create something distinctly different, and it correctly applies to anything from straw-reinforced mud like adobe to even plywood or fiberboard—which is a mix of wood and glue. But recently, composites have begun to more specifically refer to a class of materials called fiber-reinforced polymers (FRPs), of which fiberglass, carbon fiber, and Kevlar belong. What adds to the confusion is that these composites are usually referred to by their fiber composition, and not their binders. For example, carbon fiber is actually made of the eponymous carbon fibers and a binding matrix—be it resin, epoxy, or some other polymer, which are sometimes plastics and sometimes not. For that reason, I don't know if composites can be called descendants of plastic—in principle, they've existed even before plastics (plastic as a word has its own complicated history). But as soon as synthetic plastics were invented, we were mixing it with other things to enhance their properties. I think people in the industry think of composites as their own world; sometimes overlapping with plastics, sometimes not.
Your book highlights a number of significant projects around the world that have made use of composites. But as you obviously know, we still tend to build most buildings more or less like we did a century or more ago: with wood, concrete and steel. Why do you think the building industry has lagged behind others like aerospace or shipbuilding with regard to these materials?
Oh I love this question because it is kind of like the portal to a deep and fascinating rabbit hole in architecture. It's actually how I start many of my graduate classes in architecture—by posing this question to the students. And I've published some articles about it (link here and here).
Basically, in my opinion, it boils down to how we define a good building. And I don't think the answer is very clear in the minds of many people; or maybe more precisely, it's highly variable. We all know generally what makes a better airplane or car: something that goes from one place to another more quickly, efficiently, safely, and comfortably. But I don't know if people have a great sense of what makes a better building.
I think what is often underappreciated is how many different ways we want our buildings to serve us—and therefore, what constitutes a good building. Think of the difference between what makes a good church versus what makes good disaster-relief shelters—both types of buildings are the products of architectural work today, even from Pritzker prize-winning architects. And we have so many evolving considerations for architecture, too.
I think about sustainability as a good example of this. Today, we are very concerned about sustainability in buildings. But when I was in graduate school, this was barely on the radar for things to be concerned about. And certainly centuries ago, architects were not thinking of it in the way we do now. Wellness and equity are now a big part of the discussion right now; but those considerations are a bigger part of the picture than even a little while ago. So we've evolved on what we ask our buildings to do. And when we evolve what we want our buildings to do, our definition of what 'good' is must evolve, too. If we don't know what's better, then we don't progress and innovate.
This is why I've advocated that all architectural projects be extremely explicit and transparent about their ambition from the outset. Not only does this align all the parties involved in working towards a goal; it also helps us measure success. When we have those measures, we can search for the material properties and processes that will help further them.
How much do you see composite materials becoming more commonly used in the building industry in the future?
In an ideal world, we'd have a diversity of materials, with their diversity of properties and processes, being used for a diversity of architectural goals in a diversity of geographies. I think composites play a big part in this kind of future because of their properties, processes, and design potentials. They can do things no other material can and be made with processes that are unique. I think that's cool, and I would love to see more of it. I would shudder to think of a world composed of only a handful of building materials and methods.
You say that in an ideal world the role of composites in mainstream building would expand, but in the real world, it seems as if we're remaining loyal to steel, concrete and other traditional materials. What has to change for carbon fiber or other composites to make it into, say, the average office building or school or house?
This is really a question of how to spur innovation in architecture. And it's also related to my previous answer, which is that it depends on what our ambitions are and how we measure success.
If you feel that our buildings and environment cannot get any better than they are now, then there's no reason to do anything but build things the way they've always been built. But if your goal is to improve things, then you'll be searching for the best materials and methods to achieve those goals regardless of whether they're traditional or not. At the very least, it's a more engaged, curious, and optimistic way of approaching work. But for things to change in architecture, to the point where someone would consider something besides wood, concrete, or steel for a building, it means many things have to change up and down the AEC (architecture-engineering-construction) process.
I think about it from the perspective of my partner, who's an economist: most everybody is primarily responding to their most immediate incentives. And in architecture and construction, almost everything is set up to reward the cheapest, easiest way to do things. To change this means changing the fundamental way we value design and construction—perhaps in part so that initial upfront costs are not the biggest factor in so many decisions, which is typically what drives processes towards existing technologies with the largest number of competitors.
SFMOMA expansion, one of 18 case studies in Composite Architecture (SFMOMA)
Though changing the fundamental way we value design seems like a big lift, I actually think it's very necessary, and it's starting to happen, at least in other fields.
For instance, if you look at infrastructural or civil engineering, where carbon fiber and composites are starting to find the largest market growth, it's because many people are starting to realize that building bridges, tunnels, and other infrastructure with initial upfront costs as the main driver means that you are essentially ignoring the future cost of maintenance and upkeep. And as we know, failing to maintain our civil infrastructure is an issue of life-safety. But if you factor in costs of maintenance, replacement, or you look at things through the lens of a life-cycle analysis, then that is where many non-conventional materials and technologies prove their value.
These expanded considerations change the calculus, and I think that is how things need to change in order to innovate in our built environment. We have to be able to advocate for value outside of the cheapest and easiest, and we can't really address the really important things that we say we value in architecture, like sustainability or equity, unless we address the way we value the process of design itself. We also have to realize that a novel ambition is an innovation in and of itself. That's why I say that clearly articulating ambition is the first step towards innovation. When we ask our buildings to do new things, then that necessity becomes the mother of invention.
The fact that you've rubbed elbows with Richard Meier, Stephen Holl, and Diller & Scofidio is naturally going to pique people's interest. What did you learn from each architect or firm? And even if it's in safely diplomatic terms, could you tell us anything about these famous architects' personalities or the way they operate?
Yes, I wanted to mention the other offices a bit, as they've obviously had a big, if not absolutely fundamental, impact on the way I think about things. I also studied closely with Peter Eisenman at Yale, and was there at the same time as Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, and Greg Lynn, and that also played a big part.
I think the biggest impact though, in retrospect, was working with Steven Holl and Liz, Ric, Charles, and Ben at DS+R. Both of those offices approached architecture as fundamentally about ideas. For them, the ideas behind the architecture were primary, and everything else—construction, technology, detailing, etc.—should work to support the idea. It meant you worked hard to find the best idea to address the situation, and then worked hard to solve the technical problems to realize the idea, even if it meant that you were creating new technology to do so, or even if it meant you were not doing a building.
For everything I worked on at DS+R, we essentially had to create new technological solutions—which is where my experience with composite material technology in architecture came from. We tried using composites on a museum before aborting it and fully realizing it on a house. At the time, few others had done it, but it was the best technological application for the situation at hand. But that kind of approach is hard, takes a lot of effort and creativity, and doesn't always pan out. In contrast, every other architecture firm that I've had experience with approached architecture as a set of known technical solutions to whatever problem is in front of them. This is illuminated by the joke that when you approach an architect, no matter what your problem is, the answer is a building—and a building similar to one they've already done before. I think there is a time and a place for that, and it may be the most appropriate solution in many cases, but not always—it depends on your goals.
I think that was my biggest takeaway from working with Eisenman, Steven Holl, and DS+R is that everything you do should be in support of an idea. And a spirited debate about ideas is good. But if it isn't an idea that's leading your efforts, then it's something else. And you don't want the tail wagging the dog.
DS+R's Slow House, which utilizes composite materials (Diller Scofidio + Renfro)
You spent a few years in the 2010s working for Lever Architecture, which has become known for several projects utilizing mass-timber framing. Given your interest in composite materials, what do you make of the rise of mass timber in architecture in America in recent years? Will we see a proliferation of tall wood buildings?
I think it's exciting to see timber used in this way and I think mass timber has incredible potential in many cases. But mass timber is not at all the right solution in many cases. If we're talking structures for tall buildings, you'd have to be very smart about what function that wood will serve in those tall buildings. It's not a slam dunk to just use mass timber for every purpose, structural and aesthetic, in every building, tall and small. And that calculus changes from geography to geography and from use to use.
What I'd like to steer clear of is any superficial discussion of one material being 'better' than another, or only one material representing the future across all geographies and peoples and use-cases. I think if we can advance a more nuanced and thoughtful discussion of architectural goals and material intelligence, we can create a richer, more diverse, more sensitive, and ultimately, better built environment.
Could you tell us a little bit about Urban Form, the online resource for zoning regulations you’ve been developing? How did you become interested? Where did you see a gap that could be filled?
I often wonder if people are curious about the link between my material research and my technology company. But one was born from the other.
As I was doing research for and writing my book about composite materials, I would often talk to people outside of architecture or I would be giving these talks at material conferences as the lone architect in a room full of material engineers. And when you talk to people outside of architecture, and you explain carbon fiber to them—it's a material that is ten times as strong as steel, is a fraction of the weight, it doesn't rust, it doesn't rot, and can be designed to make these amazing shapes and structures—the very next question everybody has is why carbon fiber isn't used more in architecture.
And then what all the material engineers and fabricators want to know is how to break into the architecture and construction market when from a purely engineering standpoint it's an absolute no-brainer. The advanced materials industry is continuing to grow and innovate in aerospace, nautical, and automotive industries, so architecture and construction seems like the next most logical large-scale engineering based application for their technologies—and it's a huge market. So I had to think long and hard and do lots of research to categorize all the reasons why architecture has so effectively resisted different technologies, material or otherwise.
That thinking formed the basis of my articles about innovation in architecture. But one reason for technological stagnation in architecture is because of regulations.
Regulations play a surprisingly large, but hidden, part of the reason why our buildings and cities look the way they do. And currently, those regulations are complicated, opaque, and hard to access. This creates inefficiencies across planning, real estate, architecture, and construction. If you could make this regulation more accessible, you open up the possibility for more efficiency and innovation. That's what UrbanForm does: it makes those complicated zoning regulations accessible, and it was born from a deep dive into material research and the obstacles for the adoption of innovation into architecture.
A rendering by NC3D for Truong's new company (Polytechnica/UrbanForm)
How might you like to see Portland’s zoning change?
I love it when I show UrbanForm to people and they can immediately see how antiquated many zoning rules are. Zoning is created by legislation, and as we know, legislation is often added to and rarely removed or simplified. And so you end up with this incredibly complex layering and quilting of rules and regulations, documented in text form, but with three dimensional, spatial ramifications. And nobody has a full grasp of it—not the city, not any individual citizens, not even dedicated professionals who are more or less familiar with certain aspects of it.
Portland's zoning code is almost 4,000 pages long. It's just too complicated, and before UrbanForm, it took hours of reading and drafting to figure out what the spatial results of the zoning rules were for just a single piece of property. The goals of zoning are relatively simple: to help shape the growth of the city towards certain goals. But if nobody knows what the results of the rules are, nobody can control it. Furthermore, you have only a few people who are making the rules for it, with imperfect information. It's rife with inadvertent consequences, unintended incentives, and information asymmetries.
Right now, we deal with zoning essentially one patch at a time, which is the way architects and developers currently work with the city. Ideally, if you have the digital tools to understand the spatial results of the rules, you can involve more people and create better rules.
You’re also an adjunct professor at Portland State University. How would you characterize its architecture department and the kind of education aspiring architects can get there? I think of the department being maybe less technologically oriented and more about artful thinking and community. What’s your take? And how do some of your fields like composite-material technology fit in?
Oh boy, I feel like I could talk about PSU all day. First of all, I love PSU and always have. I went to kindergarten at Helen Gordon (the childcare facility for children of PSU students and faculty), and my parents were given an education at PSU because of government refugee assistance programs in the ’70s and ’80s. I will always remember walking through the Park Blocks as a kid with my parents and being in awe at the people, students, buildings, and particularly the libraries. So I'm so happy to be a part of the PSU community now as an adjunct professor in the architecture department. But I'm also happy to be coming to teaching after a long professional career and with the experience of having attended and taught in east coast universities, as well.
Academia has a different set of incentives than the rest of the world, partly by design. The whole idea of academic tenure was set up just for that—to remove certain people from the pressures of the rest of the world, hopefully for productive reasons. There is a distance from which that academic remove from the real world can be productive, but there is also a distance from which it makes a department irrelevant. And it is the struggle for every department in every university to try and design the nature of that academic engagement with the rest of the world and balance that distance for certain purposes. This is something that I think the department at PSU is trying to figure out right now in light of all the contemporary issues of the city and architecture.
What is great about architecture is that there are so many ways to contribute to the built environment. Certainly through artful thinking, as you state, but also through technical competence and innovation. I do think sometimes there is the tendency to think that architects (or an architecture department) contribute to one and not the other, but I might suggest that that's a false choice. You can do both, and the opportunity and challenge of architecture has always been to contribute to so many different aspects and functioning of our cities. Our buildings and cities are not just artful and community oriented or technologically competent—they're both, they're related, and one doesn't really function without the other.
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