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Giant orb by Bjarke Ingels and Jakob Lange makes Burning Man debut

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The first images of the finished product are in

A rendering has the giant reflective orb sitting in the middle of the dusty Black Rock Desert as Burning Man attendees pass by. The structure will stretch 84 feet in diameter.
The orb designed by Bjarke Ingels Group will be a central landmark for festival-goers.
Renderings via Dezeen

If you’re looking for out-of-this-world design, you’ll probably find it at Burning Man. Just look at the ORB, an inflatable mirrored sphere that a group of architects and artists led by BIG’s Bjarke Ingels and Jakob Lange brought to this year’s festivities in the Black Rock Desert.

Based on the first images of it on Instagram, the finished result is everything the renderings promised—except, well, the surreal mirror quality that would have made it a true miracle in expectedly dusty and windy conditions.

The architects intended the giant sphere to act as a guiding landmark for festival-goers, with lights underneath the structure casting a luminous glow to transform it into an oversized disco ball. The giant art piece stretches nearly 84 feet in diameter—one-500,000th the size of the face of the Earth—and would, ideally, reflect the surrounding landscape.

A post shared by Ron Ruiz (@hugeruiz) on

Earlier this summer, Ingels and Lange launched an Indiegogo campaign to raise $50,000 toward procuring necessary infrastructure ancillary to the sphere, such as the mast, a baseplate, and foundation anchors. Though the Indiegogo campaign only raised about 70 percent of its goal, it appears the team was able to get it off the ground anyway.

Here’s a look at initial renderings.