1: 20 model

During a one-month internship in the Paris-based AP5 (architecture, landscape and urbanism) office, I was asked to build a prototype of a mobile structure. The latter was designed to be part of a future choreography for the urban vertical dance company Retouramont. They had commissioned a structure that could stand still, roll, tip on its sides, and at the end of the performance, fly of the ground while supporting three dancers within or on it. 
The overall outline of the structure had been designed but without any detailing of the joints and assembling mechanisms. The tensegrity structure was mixed with a double ring wheel. The main challenge was to limit metal joinery systems and favour different sorts of knots, in order to stay as close as possible to the dance company’s ethos and working methods that are heavily rope-based.
I was therefore asked to model details to test at a 1:1 scale, draw technical details and investigate materials. Communication with the head choreographer and technician was key to ensure decisions were always made considering the dancer’s needs and their security.

Technical and conceptual resolutions of the overall mechanism and joinery details

1:5 model

Images of the Dancers’ Mobile Structure in action by Retouramont
Images of the Dancers’ Mobile Structure in action by Retouramont
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