This nine foot tall wooden sculpture of San Francisco was made with glue and 105,387 and a half toothpicks. It was built by Scott Weaver who, stuck at home at the age of 14 with spinal meningitis, started working in earnest on the project and continued on it for 37 years. It has 10 different starting points and 5 different weaving track ‘tours’ throughout for ping pong balls to roll through, hence its name: Rolling Through the Bay.
Weaver shares the sculpture’s details in this episode of Coolest Thing. You can see Rolling through the Bay in person at its home inside San Francisco’s Exploratorium at Pier 15.
Next, watch The Weather Artist: Chasing Storms With Sculpture, Curious Contraptions by automata artist Paul Spooner, and The Wintergatan Marble Machine.This Webby award-winning video collection exists to help teachers, librarians, and families spark kid wonder and curiosity. TKSST features smarter, more meaningful content than what's usually served up by YouTube's algorithms, and amplifies the creators who make that content.
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