THEMOSELYSNOWFLAKESPONGE

LEVEL ONE

A USC LIBRARIES DISCOVERY FELLOW PROJECT

AT THE INTERSECTION OF MATHEMATICS, ART,
AND LIBRARIES

In 1926, mathematician Karl Menger discovered the first

three-dimensional fractal, which came to be called, in his
honor, the Menger Sponge. Eighty years later Dr. Jeannine
Mosely, an MIT-trained engineer, built a model of this
extraordinary object using 66,000 business cards.

Now Dr. Mosely has discovered a relative of Menger’s

original fractal—the Mosely Snowflake Sponge. USC
Libraries Discovery Fellow Margaret Wertheim and Dr.
Mosely are leading the USC community in constructing
this unique mathematical form out of 49,000 business
cards. This is the first time in the history of the world, and
perhaps the universe, that this wondrous fractal object will
be brought into being.

These instructions describe how to assemble a level

one Mosely Snowflake Sponge, a smaller variant of the
level three fractal under construction at USC. Additional
information as well as instructional videos are available
online at www.usc.edu/libraries/sponge.

ABOUT JEANNINE MOSELY

A graduate of MIT with a Ph.D. in electrical engineering
and computer science, Mosely has pursued a career in
three-dimensional modeling software. She is well-known
for her Business Card Menger Sponge, a large-scale,
participatory, origami project that engaged hundreds
of people across the USA. Mosely believes that folding
origami structures is a way of giving life to mathematical
theorems and formulae. Her recent work focuses on
folding curved lines in modular forms and tessellations.
She designed and developed the methods for creating the
Mosely Snowflake Sponge.

ABOUT MARGARET WERTHEIM

Margaret Wertheim is a science writer, curator, and the
author of books on the cultural history of physics and
perception. In 2003, she and her twin sister Christine
founded the Institute For Figuring, a Los Angeles-based
organization that explores the poetic and aesthetic
dimensions of science and mathematics. In 2011, she
became the USC Libraries inaugural Discovery Fellow. Her
most recent book—Physics on the Fringe: Smoke Rings,
Circlons, and Alternative Theories of Everything—was
published in October 2011 by Walker & Co.

ABOUT THE USC LIBRARIES DISCOVERY FELLOWSHIP

Dean Catherine Quinlan established the Discovery
Fellowship in 2011 to encourage students and scholars
to engage library collections in inventive and surprising
ways. As the libraries’ first Discovery Fellow, Margaret
Wertheim has curated The Marine Sublime—an event that
explored the relationship among art, marine biology, and
rare scientific works in the libraries’ special collections—
and a discussion and workshop that investigated
the mathematical character of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s
Adventures in Wonderland. With Jeannine Mosely, she is
leading the Snowflake Sponge project at USC. www.usc.edu/libraries
www.usc.edu/libraries/sponge
 MAKINGTHELEVELONESPONGE
EACH LEVEL ONE SPONGE REQUIRES 108 STANDARD BUSINESS CARDS

HOW TO MAKE CARD CUBES

1. 2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8.

9. 10. 11.

1. Place one business card across another, centered and at right angles to the first. 2. Fold the flaps down as shown. 3. Separate the
cards. Make 6 for each cube. 4. Assemble the cards so that all the flaps are on the outside, matching short edges to long edges. 5-8.
Adding each of the 6 cards to complete the first cube. 9-10. Link 2 cubes together by slipping a flap from one cube under the corners
of 2 flaps on an adjacent cube, then slip the matching flap from the first cube under the other 2 corners of the flaps on the second
cube. 11. Link a third cube to form a 3-cube rod.

COMBINING CUBES TO MAKE A LEVEL ONE SPONGE

1. 2.

3. 4. 5. 6.

1-2. Make three cubes. 3-6. Make 4 rods of 3 cubes. Note the orientation of the flaps. Two of the middle faces should have horizontal
flaps, the other two should have vertical flaps.
 MAKINGTHELEVELONESPONGE
EACH LEVEL ONE SPONGE REQUIRES 108 STANDARD BUSINESS CARDS

COMBINING CUBES TO MAKE A LEVEL ONE SPONGE

7. 8.

9. 10. 11.

7. Link the 2 single cubes to one of the rods to form a U shape. 8. Attach the U module to a rod of three cubes as shown. Swing the
U and the rod together and slip the marked flaps under the neighbor’s flaps as indicated by the arrows. 9. Eight linked cubes. 10. Add
another rod of 3 cubes. 11. Add the fourth rod of 3 cubes. 12. Build 4 additional cubes into vacant midsections (A-D below) so that all
6 faces form a cross. 13. The finished Level One Mosely Snowflake Sponge.

12. 13.