A spacey looking planetarium with a truncated conical shape opened to the public last week in Greenwich, U.K., home of both GMT and John Harrison, who founded the longitudinal system in 1773. The $30 million Peter Harrison Planetarium, designed by architects Allies and Morrison, eschews the usual 19th-century notion of domed hemispherical designs, opting instead for a more acoustic-friendly sculptural form that tilts 51.5 degrees north, in direct alignment with the North Star. Made of bronze and topped with a circular, slanted mirror surface, the planetarium features one of the most advanced digital laser projectors in the world and has a grooved line running up its center to indicate its precise position on the prime meridian at exactly zero degrees longitude.
Greenwich's New Conical Planetarium
A spacey looking planetarium with a truncated conical shape opened to the public last week in Greenwich, U.K., home of both GMT and John Harrison, who founded the longitudinal system in 1773. The $30 million Peter Harrison Planetarium, designed by architects Allies and Morrison, eschews the usual 19th-century notion of domed hemispherical designs, opting instead […]
