Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts The Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts (originally known as Pioneer Theater Auditorium) is a theater located in Reno, Nevada. It was designed by the Oklahoma City architectural firm of Bozalis, Dickinson and Roloff as a concrete structure with a distinctive gold geodesic dome roof. The facility was completed in 1967 with 987 seats on the main level and 513 seats in a balcony, totaling to 1,500. The co-founder of Temcor, the project's contractor, was Don Richter, a student of Buckminster Fuller, developer of the geodesic dome concept. Temcor had built several gold-anodized aluminum
Geodesic dome resists sun and weathering. Some form of internal flashing or caulking must be placed over the joints to prevent drafts. The 1963 Cinerama Dome was built from precast concrete hexagons and pentagons. Given the complicated geometry of the geodesic dome, dome builders rely on tables of strut lengths, or "chord factors". In "Geodesic Math and How to Use It", Hugh Kenner writes, "Tables of chord factors, containing as they do the essential design information for spherical systems, were for many years guarded like military secrets. As late as 1966, some 3"ν" icosa figures from "Popular Science Monthly" were all anyone