Floralis Generica

This guide to the Floralis Genérica in Buenos Aires traces architect Eduardo Catalano's gift to his home city: a giant steel flower engineered to open at dawn and close at dusk like a living bloom. You'll hear how he trained under Walter Gropius, taught for decades at MIT, and funded the eighteen-ton sculpture himself when he sent it home in 2002. Listen for how the hydraulics meant to mimic nature didn't always cooperate, starting with a jammed mechanism in its first two years.