Site Specific Colonisation: Self-sustaining habitat on Mars

This Master’s thesis studies the current role and future possibilities of architects while dealing with the topic of taking a human mission to Mars in the upcoming decades. My main idea is to create a larger scale systematic approach to a more site-specific form of colonisation.

At the moment most of the spatial descisions to colonize Mars are made mainly from technological and economical viewpoint. It creates a danger that the failures of past colonisations to “new worlds” will be repeated. It is possible that a new Martian colony will consist from a field of unorganised architectural objects - a junkspace as a result of modernisation, as R. Koolhaas has described. In contrast to this prevailing idea I have tried to find solutions to counter these upcoming problems by creating a large scale systematic approach to a more site-specific form of colonisation. The scientific base created on Mars should be as self-sustaining as possible already from the start and also when expanding over time. We need a system how the architectural solutions in this base could be adapted to the Martian surface and programmatic needs of the habitat.\nThe main principle how to organise the space on Mars is to envision the research base as a backwards evolving system. The first rigid habitation modules, sent from earth will get additions over time by more flexible architectural solutions. These rigid modules will host the most essential functions such as the In-Situ Resource Utilisation system or the command centre and sleeping quarters. The next phase of construction will consist of assembled or pneumatic structures, which have a greater mass-to-volume ratio when transporting them from Earth. These structures can host the secondary, but also essential living units, such as the gym or the greenhouse.\nFurther expansion of the base will be achieved by using the local building materials found on Mars while combining proto-architectural simple habitat forms with advanced building tools or computational algorithms sent from Earth. It allows the Martian research base to function as a unique architectural laboratory, where the final descisions about the spatial arrangement of the built environment will be made on site, by the scientists operating in the base. The role of an architect here is to design the building processes and the system how the base will evolve over time on the planning scale.