A series on world exhibitions, technology, and the politics of imagined futures

Tomorrow Was Here

Every world’s fair is a curated bet on the future. But more than that: it is a political act. To make a particular future feel inevitable before it has been decided. These are the visions that became infrastructure, and what they cost.

Est. 2026 · Biweekly · World exhibitions, 1798 — present

1893 World's Columbian Exposition

Essays

Latest Essay

1893 Chicago

The Night They Lit the World

The procurement that wired the world

On the evening of 1 May 1893, President Grover Cleveland pushed a gilded button in Chicago and more than a hundred thousand incandescent lights came on at once. The effect was disorienting. The scale was not architectural but meteorological. The White City…

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1900 Paris

The Walkway That Waited

Built for a fair: Saved by a radio mast

Repurposed Futures The Timing Problem Read →

1952 Stockholm

The Borrowed Future

The automobile city travelled by prestige

Futures as Infrastructure Futures That Required the State Prestige Futures Read →

1939 New York

The Future They Chose to Build

GM Futurama and the automobile society

Futures as Infrastructure Futures That Required the State Read →

The Lenses

Each essay engages one or two recurring analytical themes. These are not categories - they are lenses that accumulate meaning across the archive.

Futures as Infrastructure Futures That Required the State Invisible Winners Prestige Futures Repurposed Futures The cities of Europe were rebuilding after 1945. American consultants arrived alongside reconstruction funding The Hidden Assumption The Timing Problem

The Series

One exhibition. One hidden assumption. One pattern that still operates today. New essay every two weeks.

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