The document describes a virtual reality exercise where participants envision the year 2100. Participants create, amplify, or destroy "urban objects" and design their own neighborhood for 100 inhabitants. They give their neighborhood an adjective, value, and group of inhabitants. Neighborhoods are combined into a city called Tamara. Participants also receive an envelope challenging them to further develop their neighborhood. The purpose is to have visual conversations that question assumptions, make the impossible seem possible, explore radical solutions, and include marginal voices in envisioning future cities.

1. VISUAL CONVERSATIONS ON URBAN FUTURES
Designing Tamara.

2. Welcome to the year 2100

3. Welcome to the year 2100
Welcome to the Alternate
Reality Mesh.

4. Welcome to the year 2100
Welcome to the Alternate
Reality Mesh.
Welcome to the Centre for
Urbanism Prototyping.

5. Welcome to the year 2100
Welcome to the Alternate
Reality Mesh.
Welcome to the Centre for
Urbanism Prototyping.

6. THINK OFTHE CITY ASYOU KNOW IT.
WHICH ‘URBAN OBJECTS’ DO YOU WANT TO:
CREATE | AMPLIFY | DESTROY
Time: 5 minutes
1

7. ‘urban objects’
“smaller than a building, bigger than a
phone”
(Dan Hill)

8. INTRODUCE YOURSELF TO YOUR NEIGHBOURS.
WHAT ISYOUR NAME,AGE, CITY OF ORIGIN,AND JOB?
WHAT ARE YOUR URBAN OBJECTS TO
CREATE/AMPLIFY/DESTROY?
(PUT YOUR CARDS ON THE NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN)
Time: 5 minutes
2

9. 3
DESIGN YOUR NEIGHBOURHOOD. ABOUT 100 PEOPLE WILL
LIVE IN IT.
MAKE SUREYOU USE ALL OFTHE URBAN OBJECTSYOU
CREATED,THOSEYOU WANTTO AMPLIFY,
AND NONE OFTHE ONESYOU WANTTO DESTROY.
Time: 20 min

10. 4
USE THE FORM TO FIND AN ADJECTIVE, A VALUE, AND A
GROUP OF INHABITANTS FOR YOUR NEIGHBOURHOOD.
THEN, CREATE THE MICRO-MANIFESTO
Time: 5 min

11. “a __________ neighbourhood of ____________
designed with _____________ in mind”
adjective values
people

12. 5
LET’S GET THE NEIGHBOURHOODS
TOGETHER AND CREATE THE CITY OF TAMARA!

13. 6
BUT A CITY IS NOT JUST AN ARCHIPELAGO OF
NEIGHBOURHOODS.
HAVE A LOOK AT YOUR GOLDEN ENVELOPE AND EMBRACE
THE CHALLENGE! (ONE ENVELOPE EACH NEIGHBOURHOOD)
PLEASE, ONE PERSON PER GROUP AT ATIMETO WORK ONTHE
MAP
Time: 20 min

14. Thank you very much_
now let’s get back to reality.

15. Welcome to the year 2100
Welcome to the Alternate
Reality Mesh.
Welcome to the Centre for
Urbanism Prototyping.

16. Welcome to the year 2100
Welcome to the Alternate
Reality Mesh.
Welcome to the Centre for
Urbanism Prototyping.

17. Welcome to the year 2100
Welcome to the Alternate
Reality Mesh.

18. Welcome to the year 2100

19. Welcome back to year 2016

20. “Your gaze scans the streets as if they were
written pages: the city says everything you must
think, makes you repeat her discourse, and while
you believe you are visiting Tamara, you are
only recording the manes with which she defines
herself and her parts”
(Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities. 1972)

21. Model of city for the film
Logan’s Run - 1976

22. Bel Geddes, Futurama -
1939

23. Nick Dunn, Paul Cureton,
Serena Pollastri (2014)
“A Visual History of the
Future”
UK Government Office for
Science

24. What would be ways of building visions and
scenarios of urban futures that articulate
the plurality, differences, and conflicts that
characterise the city, rather than being
based on consensus and internal coherence?

25. What would be ways of building visions and
scenarios of urban futures that articulate
the plurality, differences, and conflicts that
characterise the city, rather than being
based on consensus and internal coherence? Utopie,
1968-197X

26. What would be ways of building visions and
scenarios of urban futures that articulate
the plurality, differences, and conflicts that
characterise the city, rather than being
based on consensus and internal coherence? Datapolis (ODI)
2016

27. VISUAL CONVERSATIONS ON URBAN FUTURES
Processes and artefacts that utilise visual
language to enable or document voices
imagining and debating possible futures for
life in the city

28. VISUAL CONVERSATIONS ON URBAN FUTURES
Processes and artefacts that utilise visual
language to enable or document voices
imagining and debating possible futures for
life in the city
An Atlas of
Future Imaginary Cities

29. VISUAL CONVERSATIONS ON URBAN FUTURES
Processes and artefacts that utilise visual
language to enable or document voices
imagining and debating possible futures for
life in the city
An Atlas of
Future Imaginary Cities

30. VISUAL CONVERSATIONS ON URBAN FUTURES
question assumptions
“make possible what appears to be
impossible” (Lefebvre)
explore truly radical solutions
bring marginal voices to the conversation.

31. Thank you.
Serena Pollastri - ImaginationLancaster
s.pollastri@lancaster.ac.uk
@sere_miru