Kaiser Aluminum

Kaiser Aluminum, the producer whose aluminium geodesic domes carried Fuller's geometry into Cold War diplomacy and American civic architecture alike.

In 1959 a 200-foot, 78-foot-high gold-anodized Kaiser Aluminum dome was erected for the American National Exhibition at Sokolniki Park, Moscow. It received 3 million visitors in six weeks and was the site of the Nixon–Khrushchev "Kitchen Debate". The Russians were impressed enough that they bought the dome.

Kaiser Aluminum domes were also constructed in numerous locations across the United States — Virginia Beach, Virginia among them — alongside auditoriums, weather observatories, and storage facilities that used the same system.

Role in Fuller's world

Kaiser Aluminum is where the geodesic dome became an instrument of American soft power. The Moscow dome put Fuller's geometry in front of three million Soviet citizens as a demonstration of what an open industrial economy could produce — and then was sold to them.

See Also

• Geodesic Dome — the form Kaiser manufactured at scale
• Fuller and the Military — the Cold War trade-fair dome programme

Sources

• Fuller and the Military — the 1959 Moscow dome, its dimensions, attendance, and the Kitchen Debate
• Geodesic Dome — Kaiser Aluminum domes across the US and their civic uses