Forms of the Plane · 3D
Flower of Life in 3D
Spheres through each other’s centres
The Flower of Life is a plane of circles, each through its neighbours’ centres. Give every circle its sphere and stack layers above and below in the hollows: the densest packing in space, gathered into a ball as the flat Flower is gathered into a disc. The flat Flower is its middle layer.
- Spheres
- 13 / 55 / 177
- Lattice
- FCC
Turn it in your hands, strike it to hear the chord of its edges, slice it with a plane or lift it into four dimensions.
Facts
- The middle layer’s equators are exactly the flat Flower. A true cut also meets the layers above and below, adding a small circle through the corners of every triangle.
- One ring gives the vector equilibrium, twelve around one. Two rings give 55 spheres: a vector equilibrium twice the size.
- Stacked forever, this is the face-centred cubic lattice: Kepler’s densest packing.
Across the dimensions
- Equator of 24-CellOne dimension up, the same packing is centred on the 24-cell.
- Its slice Seed of LifeThe Seed is the middle layer of thirteen spheres: twelve gathered around one.
- Its slice Flower of LifeThe Flower is the middle layer of the densest packing of spheres.
