Rewritten from Scratch: Grasshopper 2 for Everyone

Workshop Dates: 10/21

Location: LTU, Southfield Address: 21000 West 10 Mile Road, Southfield, MI 48075

Workshop Team

Japhy Walton, McNeel and Associates

Kate Zimmerman, HGA

Registration: Regular - $175, Student - $90

Registration

Workshop Description

Grasshopper 2 is not an update — it is a complete rewrite of one of the most widely used visual programming environments in computational design. New data structures, a new component library, native looping, and a fundamentally different approach to how algorithms are constructed mean that prior experience with Grasshopper 1 is neither required nor assumed. This workshop treats that as an opportunity. Recoded from Scratch is a full-day, hands-on introduction to Grasshopper 2 running inside Rhino WIP. Designed for participants with no prior Grasshopper experience, it is equally appropriate for seasoned GH1 users approaching the new environment for the first time. The session is structured as a progressive sequence of guided exercises that build fluency with GH2’s core concepts: the canvas, data flow, data types, lists, and the components that manipulate them. By the afternoon, participants will be constructing multi-step definitions and developing an intuition for how GH2 thinks.

Learning Objectives

  • Understand the GH2 canvas and how data flows through a definition
  • Work confidently with GH2’s native data types, lists, and matching behavior
  • Use core geometry, math, and logic components to build parametric relationships
  • Read and debug an unfamiliar GH2 definition
  • Understand how GH2 differs architecturally from Grasshopper 1

Intended Outcomes

  • Participants leave with a working GH2 definition of their own construction, a reference document of core workflows, and enough foundational literacy to continue learning independently. The workshop is designed to lower the barrier of entry to computational design for practitioners, students, and educators who have felt that tools like Grasshopper required too steep a prior commitment to be accessible.
  • Technical Constraints
  • Participants must bring a Windows or Mac laptop capable of running Rhino WIP with Grasshopper 2. A free evaluation license of Rhino WIP is available from McNeel for participants who do not hold an active license. No prior knowledge of Rhino, Grasshopper, or programming is required.

Total Workshop Time: ~8 hours

Participant Information

  • Audience: Students, researchers, and professionals in architecture, design, and digital fabrication
  • Skill Level: Intermediate. Prior knowledge of Rhino/Grasshopper is helpful but not required
  • Group Size: ~25 participants
  • Hardware: Mac or Windows and the latest Rhino 9

Refund and Change Policy

Important: Refund and change requests will not be accepted beyond Monday, October 5th.