Straight from the pages of the Whole Earth Catalogue, this fragile remnant of Roy Grounds’ South Coast hideaway at Penders has National Heritage listing. It’s a sacred site for students of 1960s architecture. Situated alongside his sod-roof “The Barn” (built in 1962), the geodesic dome was initially constructed in the late 60s/early 70s to provide a tropical garden environment, complete with drip irrigation. Marr Grounds is not certain that the project was ever completely finished. It is now very fragile, but then again how many geodesic domes from this era are still in existence anywhere?

It is constructed out of treated eucalyptus saplings which was an outcome of Grounds’ extensive experimental plantings on the property and the establishment of a treatment plan in an attempt to find a sustainable forest-based enterprise for the district. The hubs of the structure are the classic galvanised iron garbage tin lids (as recommended by the WEC).

The property, to the south of Bithry Inlet (Lake Wapengo) was owned jointly by the Grounds and Myer families, and will be gifted to the National Parks in 2011.

Grounds designed and built both The Barn and the Myer house from this round-wood log material. The sod-roof element of the Barn proved to be an ideal environment for all manner of native rats, possums, lizards and other furry and slippery creatures, and so it was soon replaced with a tin roof. The whole structure was saved several years ago and the nine 45 degree beams scarfed and replaced at the same time as the heritage listing process in 2001.