Dome

Ceramics Apse, side view, from west, depicting scupper; Supported by grants from the Graham and Guggenheim Foundations, Soleri began to explore massive urban applications of his philosophies, initially in the City on the Mesa project (1958-1967), an urban plan for two million inhabitants on a plot the size of Manhattan. Using huge translucent plastic models to depict his ideas, he designed numerous high-density cities that he called 'arcologies' from their combination of architecture and ecology. From the early 1970s he built his prototype 'arcology', Arcosanti, on 14 acres of an 860-acre parcel in the high desert of central Arizona. The project was intended eventually to house 5000 people in a 25-storey chain of futuristic buildings perched on the edge of a mesa. [The current population generally varies between 70 and 120, depending on the number of students and interns working at the time.] Source: Grove Art Online; http://www.oxfordartonline.com/ (accessed 7/12/2008)