The road to Burning Man is something the Archimedes team has travelled every year for the last nine years. It is the incubator for so many ideas and ways of life, and it is the genesis of the original Archimedes Dome.

Without this space to push and mould us, we never would’ve seen the need to design something better than what we saw available. This festival has literally shaped the course of our lives.

For us, the return to this space year after year not only to brings us back to our core of innovation, but it’s a place to give back and be reminded about why we do what we do.

Normally we don’t bring the whole team to the playa every year. Most often there are other festivals and clients that need attention and we split our team to handle multiple projects.

But this year was special. After only three years of business we realized that we would have over 40 clients on the playa with one or more of our domes. For a core team of three that makes all our products by hand, that was a pretty mind-blowing accomplishment to have at one festival.

So off we headed as a team, taking on the annual drive from New York to Reno. A several day trip that consists of mostly sleeping in the car, rotating drivers and strange rest stops in unknown places.

After several days of driving we hit the home of long time friends Dana and Zach in Salt Lake City.

Not just a lovely stop-over where we get to sleep on a real bed, but also an incredible chance to connect with a little bit of their wonderful community in Salt Lake.

Since we also do performance work on top of the many other things we do, Dana put together a evening where we could show some of what we have to offer.

With the full Solar eclipse set to happen the next day, the performance focused on balance and the role the shadow has to play in our lives.

It was a wonderful evening where we truly felt the gift of getting to connect in that space.

We were up bright and early the next morning to drive 6 hours out of our way into Idaho in the hopes of catching the total eclipse.

The whole drive we weren’t really sure if the extra miles would be worth it. We had already been on the road for days and we were adding a full half day to our route.

But as the moon fully covered the sun and we saw it for the first time we were completely blown away by the magic and power of the event. It was such a good reminder that, even when we feel that what we do on earth is so important, we are truly tiny in the scope of the universe.

Perspective re-established, we got back into the truck and headed on to the serious task of Burning Man prep in Reno.

More of our journey to come!