Online gaming platform Fortnite recently introduced a new virtual esprerience developed by Epic Games in close collaboration with Zaha Hadid Architects. Called “re:imagine London,” players are left this time on an island on the shores of London, invited to explore the city as a “cooperative multiplayer experience.”
The challenge is to investigate the use of the Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN) in practical architectural applications and to bring together the talents of creators in different areas, including construction, landscape and interiors.
“Re:imagine London” investigates urban intensification and community participation in the creation of sustainable, mixed-use, walkable development. The platform's engaging and intuitive approach facilitates rapid, shared urban design among various players. As usual in Fornite's platform, built content is created at various scales as pre-composed spatial scenes, and expresses architectural, geometric, and spatial features consistent with the ZHA's built works.
The project continues ongoing research applications by ZHA's Computation and Design Group (ZHACODE) in urban planning, platform design, spatial content creation, configurators, user experience design, and future twins. Indeed, the building modules incorporate recent advances in building technologies and demonstrate a parametric approach to environmental and contextual performance through typological variation, gradation, and volumetric effects of light and materials.