Today was supposed to be the day we built my 8m diameter geodesic sphere out of bamboo and gaffa tape but I called it off yesterday morning, for the second time, due to poor British weather. Instead here is a 1:20 model made from toothpicks and epoxy resin which I have slaved over for the last two days. If only I was not so naïve as to think that the model would be built in an afternoon I would not have started it. Although I am still glad I did as I learnt something about the character of these geodesic thingy-me-jobbies, like the surprising strength it had when almost finished but up till that point required several extra arms to hold in place. Quite how I managed to single handedly make this toothpick ball is then something of a mystery, or a matter of a white tac jig and temporary sellotape ties.

This is a class I frequency IV icosahedron geodesic sphere in case you were wondering. Luckily I did not have to struggle through my book Geodesic Math and how to use it because Chris Wise gave me a program that generates “bucky balls” with their symmetry triangles. Phew.

Fingers crossed the weather will be better next Saturday.