Customer Reviews

Where's My Space Age?: The Rise and Fall of Futuristic Design

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I had this book for a while, I bought extra copies to give as gifts. We know we don't have flying cars and we haven't colonized space (it's just a bunch of rocks out there anyway...). But reading this book is like a trip to the past you forgot you had. Sure, you don't recognize most of it but once in a while you see something that is familiar. For me: the tulip chairs, the round TV set, the modular homes in France. The other fascinating piece is this journey from outer space where all is plastic-y, cold, functional, alienating and artificial, to these living spaces that feel organic, soft, suffocating and confining. I am glad we have neither, I look out my window and see my garden and the woods, I see my simple wood and leather furniture. The future in this book is frightening and inhuman: I am glad it did not happen.

This book was a bit of a disappointment, in that it takes a very simplistic view of the phrase "futuristic design." It begins with a brief explanation of the advent of the space age, from the history of the first satellites to a basic overview of human flight in space up through the Apollo program and the early establishment of the Soviet space station.
The focus then moves to the cultural response, in particular the areas of the arts and fashion. When the author uses the phrase "the rise and fall of futuristic design", the meaning is that so-called "futuristic design" is no longer being used in the arts. In many ways, this is incorrect, futuristic design is still being used in many daily products. The difference is that the klitsch element is largely gone. A great deal of it was minimally functional anyway. What has happened is that what was revolutionary is now commonplace.
Modern buildings now incorporate functionally futuristic design and humans now regularly wear permanent press clothing and nothing like the ridiculous items that are featured in this book. Other simple devices such as hearing aids, eyeglasses that automatically tint and cell phones that were once futuristic are now commonplace.
Therefore, the futuristic design that the author refers to is almost totally the absurd, mainly dysfunctional and even sometimes bizarre designs that somehow were placed under the "futuristic designs" umbrella. They were really nothing of the sort, and the world is better off that they have been dismissed.