Preservation as Experiment: Adaptive Re-Use of Buckminster Fuller’s Geodesic Dome
The 1953 geodesic dome in Woods Hole, Massachusetts is the oldest existing Fuller geodesic structure in the world. It was designed by a group of Massachusetts Institute of Technology students in early 1953, and constructed by approximately ten students from universities across the country during that summer. The structure was commissioned by architect and aspiring restaurateur Gunnar Peterson as the main dining hall for the Nautilus Motor Inn Restaurant (colloquially known as The Dome restaurant). As the first permanent wood member dome structure directly designed and overseen by Fuller himself, the Woods Hole geodesic dome is worthy of attention and conservation.
Site Location: Woods Hole, MA
Status: Academic Project
Harvard Graduate School of Design (2019)
Fall Semester
Instructor: David Fixler
Group Collaboration with Willem Bogardus and Brian Lee
This project is a preservation project to renovate and re-adapt this dome into a space for makers and an exhibition gallery. This project follows a preservation strategy that seeks to challenge the idea that conservation should merely be about aesthetics - that the aesthetic of a building is more important than its gestalt.
In this case, the spirit of the project embodies geometric and material flexibility, and thus the re-imagination of this project as a fabric clad tensile structure is a literal manifestation of this flexibility and experimentation key to Buckminster Fuller’s intent.
