The Pulse, UK

‘collapsible and expandable geodesic sensory experience’

The Pulse was a winning competition entry to The Secret Garden Party Festival of 2014. We dreamed up the idea of a ‘collapsible and expandable dome’ where the experience inside was in marked contrast to that on the outside.

‘A design that ‘pushes the limits’ of physics and architecture!’

Having won the initial competition, we then had to deliver that dream into reality. Through a collaborative pooling of knowledge, we developed some moving structural prototypes and then the detailed junctions and tolerances which would enable it to move seamlessly and beautifully.

The end result was a 7m diameter interactive experiential art piece in which you would crawl through an entrance tunnel and emerge into a completely white soft bright ‘cloud’ like chamber, a heavenly and calming space. As each of your senses become stimulated within this unique controlled environment, a finger sensor measures your heartbeat and converts the data into the sounds of a classical quintet while a central table projects waves of coloured waves of light onto the ceiling, constantly shifting and evolving in response to the beat of your heart. The over arching dome ceiling would ever so subtly move. Over a time period of twenty to thirty seconds the volume of space would triple! Giving the experience of tremendous expansion! Subsequently the subtle change would repeat in reverse, the volume of the space would contract, reducing in size by three times! Giving one the experience of claustrophobia.