Client: The Gyroid Foundation

Overview

Yellow moon gyroid is a wood sculpture honoring the work of mathematician Alan Schoen. It is now permanently installed at the Morris Library of Southern Illinois University (SIU) in Carbondale, Illinois. The sculpture is a 5ft spherical gyroid made of 93 unique plywood panels which fit together like puzzle pieces. Alan Schoen discovered the gyroid minimal surface in 1968, and the surface has exploded in popularity with the advent of 3D printing with uses from hobbyist home printers to nuclear engineering. We are grateful for the opportunity to meet Alan and to commemorate his legacy.

Goals

Yellow Moon Gyroid celebrates the intellectual discoveries and contributions of Alan Schoen an American physicist and computer scientist best known for his discovery of the gyroid. The sculpture is installed in the library at SIU where he taught her over 20 years.

Process

The panels were lasercut at Nervous System in Catskill, NY from thin plywood and shipped to Illinois flat-packed in 2 pizza boxes! The three-dimensional form of the gyroid is encoded in the shape of the panels and how they connect. Thus, the sculpture can be assembled by following the markings on the pieces and a simple set of instructions. Assembly was done collaboratively with local middle and high school students from the SIU community. The assembly occurred over the course of 2-3 hours in the Morris Library where Yellow Moon Gyroid is now permanently installed.