Steven Leckart
Design

Designing for 'Spaceship Earth': R. Buckminster Fuller's Grand Vision

Inventor, architect, and futurist R. Buckminster Fuller is the James Brown of industrial design. His work has been been sampled, covered, and channeled by countless disciples. Take Fuller’s most famous riff, the geodesic dome (which he did not actually invent, but patented). Today, there are $20,000 geodesic treehouses, geodesic aquaponic greenhouses, and a geodesic HeartBeat Dome -- a solar-powered installation at Burning Man.Like Brown’s biggest single “I Feel Good” or the frequently-sampled "Funky Drummer", it can be easy to forget to explore other Fuller gems that didn't make the Top 40. The scope and breadth of Fuller’s legacy is astounding. His career began in his late 30s, at which point he went all-in on the simple idea that his work should contribute to humanity -- or everyone aboard "Spaceship Earth."We recently attended the opening of “The Utopian Impulse”, a Fuller retrospective at SFMOMA (up through July 2012). The modest, but gorgeous exhibit charts his influence among designers in the SF Bay Area. Here’s a look.
  • R. Buckminster Fuller blueprints
  • R. Buckminster Fuller Dymaxion Car
  • R. Buckminster Fuller Dymaxion Air Ocean Map
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r-buckminster-fuller-blueprints
Inventor, architect, and futurist R. Buckminster Fuller is the James Brown of industrial design. His work has been been sampled, covered, and channeled by countless disciples. Take Fuller’s most famous riff, the geodesic dome (which he did not actually invent, but patented). Today, there are $20,000 geodesic treehouses, geodesic aquaponic greenhouses, and a geodesic HeartBeat Dome -- a solar-powered installation at Burning Man. Like Brown’s biggest single “I Feel Good” or the frequently-sampled "Funky Drummer", it can be easy to forget to explore other Fuller gems that didn't make the Top 40. The scope and breadth of Fuller’s legacy is astounding. His career began in his late 30s, at which point he went all-in on the simple idea that his work should contribute to humanity -- or everyone aboard "Spaceship Earth." We recently attended the opening of “The Utopian Impulse”, a Fuller retrospective at SFMOMA (up through July 2012). The modest, but gorgeous exhibit charts his influence among designers in the SF Bay Area. Here’s a look. One wall was packed with so much awesomeness, we had to break it down into separate slides. Between the late 1920s and his death in 1983, Fuller filed more than two dozen patents, from a hanging storage shelf unit to an “undersea island.” From left to right, top row first, there’s Fuller’s prefab 4-D House (1928), Dymaxion Dwelling Machine Wichita House (1946), Dymaxion Car* (1933), Submarisle aka Undersea Island* (1959), Prefabricated Dymaxion Bathroom (1938), Dymaxion Deployment Unit (1941), Watercraft-Rowing Needles( (1968), and a full representation of the Undersea Island. *More on these later. Photo: Ariel Zambelich/Wired