Design Futures

This specific treatise is based on the principles of the utopian text by the Italian philosopher and theologian Tommaso Campanella, «The City of the Sun.» This philosophical work contains a rich metaphor, allowing the city to be presented through geographical and architectural diagrams as a semantic center expressing the author’s religious and political views.

Concept of the project involves realizing a human-tolerant city, an innovative hydrocity, while simultaneously addressing the challenges of urbanization, climate change, and limited urban space. As our planet faces increasing environmental issues, floating cities could become a sustainable solution for the future of urban development.

Half of the world’s megacities are located near water, with nearly two billion people living along coastlines. A floating city is a modern technological infrastructure designed for self-sufficiency and situated on a body of water. The ocean has long borne the brunt of human activity. As the planet’s largest carbon sink, it absorbs excess heat and energy released by increasing greenhouse gas emissions. Floating cities are viewed as a creative approach to solving these problems by creating new, sustainable urban spaces on the water, replacing attempts to use sea walls and dams for protection.

Science holds high social prestige, and among the components of civic status are individuals' practical skills and knowledge of a wide array of crafts. Therefore, the city has the goal—and responsibility—of cultivating and stimulating intellectual endeavor.

in creating long-term autonomous communities in the ocean to allow for the experimentation and implementation of various social, political, and legal systems. Innovative, locally produced building materials enable the structures to repair themselves over time and withstand harsh natural weather conditions. The design of such settlements will allow for the use of autonomous vehicles and drones for delivery, as well as the creation of a shared route for passenger travel using only environmentally safe modes of transportation.

The concept of such settlements incorporates modern technological measures, such as solar panels, wind turbines, and advanced waste management systems, which reduce carbon emissions and environmental impact. Green sources generate precisely the amount of energy the community consumes. Furthermore, all waste must be converted into energy, secondary materials, or raw resources.

The community has a Grand Council, comprising all citizens aged 20 and older. It convenes twice a lunar month, but its functions are highly limited: it merely discusses the implementation of duties by officials, and citizens are given the opportunity to voice existing shortcomings.

Eight extensive belts, or rings, named after the eight planets encircling the entire city, immediately immerse the viewer in a circle of astrological ideas connecting rational social order with the study of the laws of nature, embodied by the movement of celestial bodies. Arches and galleries for strolling, as well as the outer walls of fortifications and buildings, are adorned with magnificent paintings, and all of this is crowned by a temple erected atop the highest hill. On the altar of this temple are earthly and celestial globes, and the dome contains depictions of all stars up to the sixth magnitude, topped on the exterior by a weather vane.

The city is located on the southern coast of South Korea, where the city of Busan is situated. The reason for establishing the Human City is that the maritime capital is highly susceptible to the effects of rising sea levels. These consequences are already being felt—between 2010 and 2020, Busan suffered from flooding more than any other city in the country.