Can a Portable Diagrid Structure Save the World?

You might have thought so if you attended the U.S. debut of Studio Dror’s QuaDror at the New Museum in Manhattan last night. Unveiled at last week's Design Indaba in Cape Town, the project, which the studio has fabricated in materials ranging from wood to concrete, uses a set of Buckminsteresque opposing triangles to create a load-bearing truss using minimal material.

At the New Museum event, which was cohosted by Designer Pages and the Huffington Post, Israel-born, New York-based Dror Benshetrit enumerated potential uses for the system—a list that included everything from room dividers to entire houses, highway sound barriers, flat-packable emergency shelters, and structural reinforcements for the world's shanty towns.

A presentation similar to the one above ran throughout Benshetrit’s talk, which was followed by a Q&A with Fast Company design editor Linda Tischler and Huff Po art editor Kimberly Brooks.


 
Dror had few details about how the product could be manufactured at scale—and how the cost would compare to similar pre-fab systems—but to see the scope of his ambitions check out the QuaDror website. In any case, the event was followed by the most party-like party I’ve ever attended for a modular structural system.


Note the corrugated metal roof supported by QuaDror joints in the background.