AbstractThe scope of the work has been to study the static and dynamic behaviour of deployable or self‐deployable structures composed by rigid elements interconnected by pin‐jointed ends and intermediate pivots, that can be assembled in order to form movable roofing systems or similar applications. Modelling of the behaviour of self‐deployable systems has been approached both during the deployment and in the fully deployed configuration. In particular, the non‐linear dynamic simulation of the deployment phase is approached as a coupled problem of dynamics and kinematics leading to a non‐linear model of the system. The problem of applying active control techniques to the resulting system is also faced, leading to the solution of the non‐linear control problem for the deployment phase, and to a bounded ‐state approach for the in‐service phase. Numerical developments have been performed in the MAT