Design Furtures

Continuing from my last blog I’m focusing on how survival systems influence visions of the future.

In many of the world leading countries there have been shelters and defence mechanism towards atomic attack since the 50s. It was in 1954 that the US Military built the first ‘atom-bomb-proof’ shelter just north of the White House in Washington. This was not just a room for the president and special staff members but a five stories high structure that would protect medical data from the military research base including pathological slides and specimens. Essentially it was an area where medical and scientific research could continue if the country was under enemy attack. This is an early example of how the environment and society you may live in affects the way you envision or plan for the future. In the 50s it was political issues and nuclear war, in modern times its economic imbalance and climate change.

In ‘Histories of the Future’ Daniel Rosenberg and Susan Harding highlight the current obsession society has with the future. Media and political hype on Global Warming has lead to a vast amount of art, design and technological projects on climate change and ways to prevent it in the future.

The Hydro-Net vision for San Francisco by the architectural company IwamotoScott is a big underground system which relies on production of Hydrogen by algae plant bases and controls and distributes energy generated from the hydrogen, water and even moisture in the foggy San Francisco air. This is a very interesting view on sustainable water use in the future but I find dubious any vision that is set in a vulnerable city like San Francisco and also when talk of hover-cars in tunnel is introduced.