Some are works of the imagination others are real ventures that pushed technology to its limits. Here, we tell the stories of six enclosed spaces. In fact, the history of these ventures is often tied up in imperial ambitions and class perspectives. Some covered synthetic environments have been designed as elitist enclosures, like gated communities. Their reliance on sophisticated technologies to engineer specific ecologies and conditions can, however, leave these spaces smacking of technofetishism and anti-democratic tendencies. Domes embody contradictory, yet symbiotic elements: protection, freedom, potential utopias. Domes have long drawn the futuristically minded, from architect Buckminster Fuller, who in 1960 imagined placing one over Manhattan to regulate atmospheric conditions, to the designers of Arizona research facility Biosphere 2 and radical artist Tomás Saraceno. And it offers a womb-like sense of safety. It is inherently strong, evenly distributing structural stress through tension. It offers the greatest volume for the least surface area, and an uninterrupted space free of columns. The sealed dome dominates, and for good reason. Yet artists, scientists, architects and engineers have been dreaming up similar enclosures for centuries. And turning to our home planet, a handful of architects are designing innovative shelters to withstand the impacts of climate change. A year later, entrepreneur Elon Musk met with 60 scientists and engineers in Colorado to discuss Mars colonization. So urged physicist Stephen Hawking in 2017, in response to human-driven shifts in planetary systems. Humanity must find viable living spaces beyond Earth in the next 100 years. The Biosphere in Montreal, Canada - a geodesic dome designed by architect Buckminster Fuller.
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