Monsanto house of the future. Stimulating my excitement I always enjoy the sense of nostalgia I get whenever I see pictures of this childishly futuristic model homes. This plastic-walled floating cruciform structure was an attraction at Disneyland – California, from 1957 t0 1967 as a part of Disney’s Tomorrowland.
Built as a joint project between Disneyland, Monsanto and MIT, the house of the future was constructed of 16 identical plastic shells, fabricated off-site. This home was meant to display technological marvels, but mainly to show many ways in which plastic could be incorporated into home buildings of the future. The house was made of fiberglass and shaped like a plus symbol elevated on a pedestal, advertised to be able to rotate on the pedestal, giving the same room both a sunrise and a sunset view in the same day. The design also allowed configuration of the modules in order to make your home bigger. Thanks to the wonders of chemistry, everything in the house was made of synthetic material, down to all the furniture. Most of the technological features were designed as a space saving and appeared out of the counter top or down from the upper cabinets with the push of a button.
This house had been seen by over 20 million visitors before being closed. The reinforced concrete foundation of the house of the future was never removed and it currently exists in its original location, painted in the dark shade of a green, and used as a planter. The house became less popular as time went on, just because it started to become a house of today.
In 2015 A LEGO replica of the iconic home was made, including interior and exterior details.
The Sanzhi UFO houses were a set of never completed and abandoned, pod-shaped buildings in Sanzhi District, New Taipei City, Taiwan. The buildings resembled Futuro houses, deisigned in 1960’s in Finland. Intended as a vacation resort, the UFO houses were constructed in 1978. At the end of the seventies, Taiwan had just overcome the oil crisis embracing the new economical boom, and the flying saucer resort was a representation of the affluence of that time. But the owner went bankrupt before the project was finished.
Although they were abandoned 30 years ago, the people stayed impressed not just because of the unique architecture, but also because of all the ghost stories written about them. There were stories of ghosts from the Dutch cemetery (underneath the structure), flying around the houses. By 2010, all of the UFO houses had been demolished.
Lithuanian pavilion, EXPO 2000, Hanover
Creator: Private ideology collective (Panevėžio statybos trestas). The pavilion was designed by Marina and Audrius Bucas, Gintaras Kuginys, Valdas Ozarinskas and Aida Ceponyte.
It was for the first time ever, on the international exhibition EXPO 2000, that Lithuania has their own pavilion…and once again, like in every decade since 1960’s, retro-utopian architectural object. The building was futuristic, glossy yellow, composed from complicated steel structures. Reputable European media organizations have declared the Lithuanian pavilion to be among the five best expositions of EXPO 2000 : “The yellow building of unusual shape looks like world’s biggest vacuum cleaner”- De Standaard reported…the lightweight steel structure, is shaped like an aero plane wing and is named “Flight”
Nita Mucha
