Transparent pavilion looks like a massive water droplet

Inspired by Buckminster Fuller’s famed geodesic domes, Copenhagen-based architect Kristoffer Tejlgaard has designed a new kind of dome that embraces modern production methods—and it’s shaped like a water droplet.

The transparent dome is the product of computer modeling, which helped Tejlgaard create the appearance of a smooth domed surface. The structure is built from rhomboid polycarbonate sheets that overlap each other “like fish scales,” according to Designboom.

Atelier Kristoffer Tejlgard

Atelier Kristoffer Tejlgard

The overlapping panels are bolted together, which makes the structure waterproof; it also allows the pavilion to take on a subtly curved shape that allows it to support itself. According to Tejlgaard, using a rhombus for the panels helped them save on materials too. “With this geometry the material waste could be reduced by approximately 30 percent compared to a geodesic dome structure based on pentagons and hexagons,” he said.

Atelier Kristoffer Tejlgard

The 270-square-foot pavilion is conceived as a catch-all hangout space, a mobile exhibition pavilion, or a droplet-shaped greenhouse. How poetic.