Konrad Wachsmann’s Architecture Machine: The Location Orientation Manipulator

Konrad Wachsmann’s Local Orientation Manipulator (LOM) was a visionary step toward the automation of architectural construction. Developed in 1969 with John Bollinger and Xavier Mendoza at the University of Southern California, the LOM was conceived as a mechanical system capable of positioning and orienting building components freely in space, enabling their precise assembly. More than a machine, the LOM represented Wachsmann’s radical belief that architecture could evolve through industrialized processes and intelligent systems. By anticipating robotic fabrication decades before it became common, the project bridged architecture, engineering, and emerging automation technologies. This book investigates the development of the LOM, contextualizes it and documents a reconstruction. 2026 is the 125th-year anniversary of Konrad Wachsmann (1901–1980), the pioneer of prefabricated building systems New research on Wachsmann’s mysterious LOM machine Richly illustrated and with several simulations