A flurry of recognition during 2008 for iconoclast Buckminster Fuller has re-affirmed the value of his architectural designs. Michael Sorkin, writing in November 2008’s Architectural Record, explores why Fuller was not more widely embraced by the architectural community of his time. Sorkin suggests Fuller treated architecture as a solution to a problem rather than as an objective; his inventiveness in pursuit of goals that transcended architecture meant he remained a misfit in architectural circles.
Fuller was an inventor, mathematician, and entrepreneur, among other occupations, and not easily slotted into any one professional category. Regardless of how the architectural world perceived him, his design legacy is extensive. Three aspects of Fuller’s work bear witness to that legacy.
1. More for less: The Dymaxion House
With sustainability the buzzword globally, Fuller’s preoccupation with using the minimal amount of materials to produce maximum impact is prescient. The Dymaxion House, designed in the late 1920’s and patented in 1946, was made from lightweight steel, duraluminium and plastic. A conventional suburban home would weigh 300,000 pounds if all of its components were accounted for. The Dymaxion House weighed in at 6,000 pounds, and was shipped to the building site in a big tube, awaiting assembly much like a child’s Lego kit.
Reflecting on her father’s legacy in a speech at the Cooper Union in September 2008, Allegra Fuller Snyder observed that Fuller’s experiments with the concept “more for less” are still bearing fruit today in the work of young architects at Architecture for Humanity. Inspired by Fuller’s lightweight structures like the Wichita House, an evolution of the Dymaxion House, and his designs for wartime shelters, these architects are producing lightweight, portable and sustainable designs for areas affected by natural and manmade disasters.
2. Geodesic Dome
If ever there was an iconic image in 20th century architecture, it is Fuller’s geodesic dome. Hundreds of thousands were built, one of the most illustrious being the US pavilion at Expo 67 in Montreal. The pavilion’s futuristic look made it appear like something from another planet. Inside, a plethora of innovative objects spoke to the US’s design superiority.
In its online review of Fuller’s work, the Design Museum notes the Expo 67 building was composed of two skins: an outer layer of triangular units and hexagonal units linked to an inner layer of hexagons. The skin was composed of acrylic panels that permitted total transparency; triangular blinds were installed and programmed to react to very bright sunlight.
The basic component of the dome was a tetrahedron. Replicated numerous times, it allowed Fuller to design a building with a huge span yet a lightweight skin. This template has been used to erect temporary shelter in Africa for displaced people, and was the basis for Fuller’s unconventional 1960 design to cover two miles in diameter of downtown Manhattan.
3. Spaceship Earth
Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth (1969) was Fuller’s essay on designing for a closed system. Fuller recognized early in his career the earth did not have infinite resources as many believed but rather finite resources. Given the planet’s closed system, it behoved people to do more with less and to use to best advantage the finite resources existing in the system. Hence Fuller’s preoccupation with designing shelter that would minimize resource demands.
Fuller’s ideas about Earth’s closed system underlie contemporary design initiatives like those of MBDC and its cradle to cradle approach. His architectural contributions may have received scant attention in most books on architecture of the 20th century, but his legacy endures. With the need for sustainable design on everyone’s horizon, Fuller is enjoying the appreciation he deserves.
Andree Iffrig - Andrée Iffrig LEED AP is a writer and award-winning graduate architect. She uses her broad background in environmental design and ...
