Largest kugel
Who
Science Museum of Virginia
Where
United States (Richmond)
When
The world’s largest kugel by both diameter and weight is entitled Mary Morton Parsons Earth-Moon Sculpture and was unveiled 8 January 2003 at the Science Museum of Virginia, Richmond, USA. The earth globe is a single piece of South African black granite polished into a sphere that is 2.653 m (8 ft 8 in) in diameter. A kugel (from the German word for ball) is a perfectly balanced, polished stone sphere that fits into a socket (base) carved to the exact curvature of the ball. The kugel revolves 360 degrees in all directions and actually floats on a thin film of water. The globes of the earth and the moon float on water so that Museum visitors can turn them. Although the globe weighs 29 tons (29.3 tonnes) the kugel phenomena makes it light enough for a child to move it.