The science fiction worlds of author Ursula K. Le Guin are more than fantastical—they’re also careful studies of how environments (and environmental crises) shape societies. It’s no surprise, then, that Le Guin is a favorite of architect Vanessa Keith, founder of Brooklyn-based StudioTEKA Design, whose new book mines similar speculative and analytical ground. Published last year by the imprint Urban Research, 2100: A Dystopian Utopia imagines how, in spite of catastrophic climate change, humanity might adapt its settlement patterns to new environmental conditions and perhaps even flourish. “All of the technologies that we’re referencing…in the book are things that someone, somewhere is researching,” Keith tells Metropolis. “We envision that in 80 years this stuff could be in place solving our problems.”

“I think that architecture and design [is] an optimistic endeavor,” says Keith. “You’re trying to imagine a future; you’re given a site, and your site has constraints, and you’re trying to imagine, ‘What is the best possible future for this place?’ Some of the stuff that we’re looking at is really dire, but if we can’t imagine a positive outcome for ourselves, it’s very, very difficult to get people to do anything except bury their heads in the sand,” she says. “Can we use some of our powers of imagination to envision potential futures for ourselves as a species?”

Great piece by Zachary Edelson on 2100: A Dystopian Utopia — The City After Climate Change in Metropolis Magazine!

Read the full article here!