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Description
Within architecture’s inherently multisensory framework, contemporary acoustic design often remains secondary, addressed through applied absorptive treatments rather than embedded spatial strategies. Despite advances in computational tools, most built environments still rely on standardized reflective materials like concrete, glass, plywood, resulting in a limited, binary understanding of acoustic performance. This research challenges that paradigm by positioning acoustics as an integral design driver and exploring material behavior as a continuous spectrum rather than fixed categories. The study investigates how emerging design and fabrication technologies can recalibrate architectural thinking, enabling acoustics to inform form, materiality, and spatial experience from the outset. It focuses on materially consistent yet geometrically varied surfaces, leveraging additive manufacturing to encode acoustic performance directly into form. Through controlled variation, a single base material is designed to exhibit a range of sonic behaviors, including reflection, diffusion, and absorption. A catalogue of 25 prototypes was developed, from which four specimens of equal weight but distinct formal characteristics were selected for testing. Acoustic performance was evaluated using ASTM E1050-12 impedance tube measurements. Results demonstrate significant variation in absorption coefficients across the samples, confirming the presence of an embedded acoustic gradient. The findings situate these prototypes within an intermediate performance range, between highly reflective glass and absorptive fiberglass, an area that remains underexplored in architectural acoustics. By integrating digital fabrication with acoustic performance, the research proposes a shift toward embedded, context-specific sonic environments. It extends the provocations: How might designers and acousticians extend the acoustic continuum between material and materiality architecturally?