The MIT School of Architecture?s Self-Assembly Lab has teamed up with Google to create Transformable Meeting Spaces, a project that utilizes woven structure research in wood and fiberglass pods that descend from the ceiling, transforming a large space into a smaller one. Designed as a small-scale intervention for reconfiguring open office plans?which ?have been shown to decrease productivity due to noise and privacy challenges??the pods require no electromechanical systems to function, but rather employ a flexible skeleton and counterweight to change shape. 

The MIT School of Architecture?s Self-Assembly Lab has teamed up with Google to create Transformable Meeting Spaces, a project that utilizes woven structure research in wood and fiberglass pods that descend from the ceiling, transforming a large space into a smaller one. Designed as a small-scale intervention for reconfiguring open office plans?which ?have been shown to decrease productivity due to noise and privacy challenges??the pods require no electromechanical systems to function, but rather employ a flexible skeleton and counterweight to change shape. This skeleton is composed of 36 fiberglass rods, which are woven together into a sort of textile or cylindrical braid. Thus, the structure behaves ?like a Chinese finger trap: The circumference of the pod shrinks when it?s pulled, and expends when relaxed.?
Courtesy of MIT Self-Assemb...