Editing Buckminster Fuller (section)

=== Housing ===

[[File:Dymaxion House exterior.jpg|thumb|right|220px|A Dymaxion house at [[The Henry Ford]] Museum in [[Dearborn, Michigan]]]]
Fuller's energy-efficient and inexpensive [[Dymaxion house]] garnered much interest, but only two prototypes were ever produced. Here the term "Dymaxion" is used in effect to signify a "radically strong and light tensegrity structure". One of Fuller's Dymaxion Houses is on display as a permanent exhibit at the [[Henry Ford Museum]] in [[Dearborn, Michigan]]. Designed and developed during the mid-1940s, this prototype is a round structure (not a dome), shaped something like the flattened "bell" of certain jellyfish. It has several innovative features, including revolving dresser drawers, and a fine-mist shower that reduces water consumption. According to Fuller biographer Steve Crooks, the house was designed to be delivered in two cylindrical packages, with interior color panels available at local dealers. A circular structure at the top of the house was designed to rotate around a central mast to use natural winds for cooling and air circulation.

Conceived nearly two decades earlier, and developed in [[Wichita, Kansas]], the house was designed to be lightweight, adapted to windy climates, cheap to produce and easy to assemble. Because of its light weight and portability, the Dymaxion House was intended to be the ideal housing for individuals and families who wanted the option of easy mobility.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Massey|first=Jonathan|year=2012|title=Buckminster Fuller's Reflexive Modernism|journal=Design and Culture|volume=4|issue=3|pages=325–344|doi=10.2752/175470812X13361292229159|s2cid=144621805}}</ref> The design included a "Go-Ahead-With-Life Room" stocked with maps, charts, and helpful tools for travel "through time and space".<ref>{{Cite news|title=Planetary Homeboy|last=Wigley|first=M|date=1997|work=Any|pages=16–23}}</ref> It was to be produced using factories, workers, and technologies that had produced [[World War II]] aircraft. It looked ultramodern at the time, built of metal, and sheathed in polished aluminum. The basic model enclosed {{convert|90|m2|ft2|abbr=on}} of floor area. Due to publicity, there were many orders during the early Post-War years, but the company that Fuller and others had formed to produce the houses failed due to management problems.

In 1967, Fuller developed a concept for an offshore floating city named [[Floating cities and islands in fiction|Triton City]] and published a report on the design the following year.<ref>{{cite book|title=A study of a prototype floating community|author=R. Buckminster Fuller|publisher=Triton Foundation|year=1968}}</ref> Models of the city aroused the interest of President [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] who, after leaving office, had them placed in the [[Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum]].<ref>{{cite journal |title=Cities on the Sea? |first=John |last=Lear |journal=The Saturday Review |volume=54 |date=December 4, 1971 |page=90}}</ref>

In 1969, Fuller began the Otisco Project, named after its location in [[Otisco, New York]]. The project developed and demonstrated concrete spray with mesh-covered wireforms for producing large-scale, load-bearing spanning structures built on-site, without the use of pouring molds, other adjacent surfaces, or hoisting. The initial method used a circular concrete footing in which anchor posts were set. Tubes cut to length and with ends flattened were then bolted together to form a duodeca-rhombicahedron (22-sided hemisphere) geodesic structure with spans ranging to {{convert|60|ft|m}}. The form was then draped with layers of ¼-inch wire mesh attached by twist ties. Concrete was sprayed onto the structure, building up a solid layer which, when cured, would support additional concrete to be added by a variety of traditional means. Fuller referred to these buildings as monolithic ferroconcrete geodesic domes. However, the tubular frame form proved problematic for setting windows and doors. It was replaced by an iron [[rebar]] set vertically in the concrete footing and then bent inward and welded in place to create the dome's wireform structure and performed satisfactorily. Domes up to three stories tall built with this method proved to be remarkably strong. Other shapes such as cones, pyramids, and arches proved equally adaptable.

The project was enabled by a grant underwritten by [[Syracuse University]] and sponsored by [[U.S. Steel]] (rebar), the Johnson Wire Corp (mesh), and Portland Cement Company (concrete). The ability to build large complex load bearing concrete spanning structures in free space would open many possibilities in architecture, and is considered one of Fuller's greatest contributions.