The Sunsphere, in Knoxville, Tennessee, is an 81.07 m (266 ft) high hexagonal steel truss structure, topped with a 23 m (75 ft) gold-colored glass sphere that served as the symbol of the 1982 World's Fair.
Designed by the Knoxville architectural firm Community Tectonics, the Sunsphere was created as the theme structure for the 1982 World's Fair. It was noted for its unique design in several engineering publications. Most of the World's Fair site ...
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The Sunsphere, in Knoxville, Tennessee, is an 81.07 m (266 ft) high hexagonal steel truss structure, topped with a 23 m (75 ft) gold-colored glass sphere that served as the symbol of the 1982 World's Fair.
Designed by the Knoxville architectural firm Community Tectonics, the Sunsphere was created as the theme structure for the 1982 World's Fair. It was noted for its unique design in several engineering publications. Most of the World's Fair site is now a public park and a convention center, but the Sunsphere remains.
In its original design, the sphere portion was to have had a diameter of 86.5 feet (26.4 m) to represent symbolically the 865,000-mile (1,392,000 km) diameter sun. The tower's window glass panels are layered in 24-karat gold dust and cut to seven different shapes. It weighs 600 tons and features six double steel truss columns in supporting the seven-story sphere. The tower has a volume of 203,689 cubic feet (5,767.8 m) and a surface of 16,742 square feet (1,555.4 m)....
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