This curio article showed up on my tablet.:
https://phys.org/news/2020-08-mathematical-magic-grids.html

The recent math paper:
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C48&q=On+Elastic+Geodesic+Grids+and+Their+Planar+to+Spatial+Deployment&btnG=

- Brian

I am not sure of the connection to NURBS, but the possibilities are intriguing.

Some joints can slide a bit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkPp9f4sRYc&feature=youtu.be