Japan 2008Polygonium
This is a modular furniture system, made by a truss structure with extruded aluminum. We got our hint from a game named “Card Castle“, a game of assembling edge-to-edge into triangle figures. Such a simply jointed triangulated structure transfer force axially, which means each peace can be thin and light, and the entire construction is capable of making long spans.
The triangles are consisted of boards and joints. There are 5 kinds of joints, which fit all configurations, and fixes the connection by driving a pin in the center hole of the joint. Assembly and disassembly is completed in an amazingly short time, because this pin is able to disconnect only by hammering on the side of the board.
One side of the triangle is 40cm; the depth of shelf is 60cm, and one side is made by two boards easy packing and transport, with the dimension of w20cm×d60cm×t10mm, hollow construction. The connected boards create a triangle with 40cm sides, able to withstand loads up to 100kg. As this aluminum block has its joint as rigid connection, it is possible to create a beam floating in the air, although it is also “masonry” construction. So, the aluminum triangle system has an interesting construction that is somewhere between masonry and trusses.
We have been designing a residence by using this system. Not just for making a shelf in a residence, this system is also strong enough to build a residence, which is easy to assemble and disassemble.
