This issue of Materia Arquitectura focuses on digital technologies and their impact on the material production of architecture. Guest editor Mauricio Loyola questions the separation between "the digital" and "the material" and invites us to reflect on digital technologies as catalysts of the physical. The issue's interviewee, Alejando Zaera-Polo, explores how digital means of production influence the theoretical approach to projects. The six articles in the dossier take a transversal look at the concepts and methods that digital media propose for the material production of architecture. Natalie Haskell opens the dossier by arguing, through theoretical references and projects, that digital technologies promote a reconnection with materials and materiality, facilitating the exploration of utopian ideals. Diego Pinochet, for his part, contextualizes the debate historically, examining the evolution of the vision of digital technologies from the cognitivist conception of the first CAD proponents in the sixties to contemporary materialist tendencies. Rivka Oxman delves into the current situation by proposing a new conceptual model called "MFD processes" (Material-Manufacturing-Design), which allows us to understand the new tectonic relationships between form, structure and material. Shelby Doyle, for his part, calls for the extension of computational thinking and parametric design action towards a new social project for architecture. Sigrid Adriaenssens explores new numerical strategies for generating cutting-edge structural forms designed from structural performance, rethinking fundamental notions of the discipline such as the relationship between form and efficiency. Finally, Gabriela Celani contextualizes the debate by examining the impact of digital technologies and materials on architectural production in our region.

Guest Editor Mauricio Loyola