Design Precedent
Fans are very simple items which are well resolved and elegant in a design sense. When we thought about the type of movement we wanted for the second skin, fans showed a number of desirable characteristics.
Fans use a series of repeated geometries which can be seen in two states: open or closed. They pivot around a screw in order to do this but the most important aspect of the fan design in terms of our design was how they stop from swinging too far. This is done with a string which ties the ends together which also forces the blades to follow each other. When you move one blade, the next must do so also and so on. After using the fan structure on our prototype, it successfully works. And that is our first prototype model.