PREFACE
By Doménica Cubides-Álvarez
UCACUE - Ecuador

¨As an architect you design for the present, with awareness of the past, for a future which is essentially unknown¨ Norman Foster.

As a student of architecture in a developing country, this science fiction essay aims to demonstrate not only the importance, but also the impact that architecture has on our environment globally, and even taking into account the speed with which the world is assimilating these new trends. That said, I want to explain how each of these trends will be key to the evolution of architecture in the near future, not only from a technical point of view, but also aesthetically.

Based on the reality we live in and the increasingly significant influence that the Asian giant is having in the world as a cultural, economic and political sphere, it is logical that little by little the current of changes generated by this country will become an architectural base to which we can all be governed.

INTRODUCTION 
Science fiction as such, as time goes by, becomes more striking and uncertain. This unknown world tells us about several utopian and dystopian realities, where although life develops in an almost perfect (not to say completely ideal) way, it also unfolds in an environment full of unethical actions that unfortunately rule us as human beings. (Sagan & Aznar, 2022).

These two ways of creating a lifestyle have led us to build an unfamiliar future, full of imagination, where the new and extravagant attracts attention, however, we must talk separately about these two terms, and understand the reason for each ideal taken for our future and that of our successors in 2100.

When talking about utopia, an ideal of modernization comes to our mind, while, on a personal level, there is a satisfaction for finding this perfect model in which construction is introduced to our homes and thus generate an easy, comfortable, and most of all useful space for the kind of life we are about to witness.

In several stories utopia is mentioned as a possible future, and why not, in this story we can also talk about the beauty of designing a perfect future, where nature rules, technology advances, and each inhabitant maintains its security in a home programmed and built thinking about every future need. Living surrounded by unimaginable creatures, adapted to the environment and giving us more life than we could ever consider, as well as the creation and adaptation of new cultures that will lead us to achieve the greatest success.

But, on the other hand, and no less important, is dystopia, why is it so feared, this answer does not need much effort to know what it is about, the ambition of the human being can become unexplainable, and thus create a personal interest without thinking about the collective development that in just a blink of an eye the life of the planet can change completely and give us another face of what it would be like to live in an uncertain tomorrow.

This makes me think that in the year 2100 we will be completely blinded, creating unconventional ways for the destruction of civilizations in a state of development, and in this way, occupy their assets for their own benefit; forming a "government" where the architecture and environment are determined and built with the ideal of survival against threats either from evolved species of flora and fauna, as well as attacks from the human being himself for thinking in an absolute control.

All these possible futures lead us to tell a story where each parameter mentioned such as cultural, political, economic and architectural will form the center of analysis. Taking into consideration the current way of life in Asia and its increase in our daily life worldwide and in each person's home, transforming it for the favorable survival of the year 2100.

CHAPTER 1
Utopia as a way of life

Within Western architecture, it is about recovering the cultural with the modern as civilization evolves, and thus everything around it, more specifically in its process of mandate in the face of what is about to approach. Walking through the streets of this new environment completely unknown to what it was for the human being of the year 2022-2023, I find myself with small memories that remain in the memory of our planet. The cities seem to look wider and cleaner, with an air of the unknown, all this thanks to the learning of the pandemics that have occurred over time until 2100, the inhabitants tell about the importance of this lifestyle to avoid the extinction of humanity as such.

This is how I immerse myself in a deeper knowledge in which every person, every animal, and in general every living being in this environment, has its designated space to generate a considerate ecosystem with the planet that keeps us alive; everything is quiet and without distractions.

Over time, the economy began to flourish more and more due to the type of money management that began to take the whole world half a century ago, and yes, I mean 2050, the maintenance of each home and its physical appearance (its architecture for a better understanding) also gave this meaning of modernization towards an uncertain but near future; and it is here where I wonder how can this be possible, all this way of life that makes us think about what at the beginning of the year 2100 began to arise, the population reached its fullness adapting to one of the most prosperous ways for each country, following the Asian culture to understand how to better manage the care of every corner of the Earth, and as a consequence, so fast and without imagining it, begin to move forward in a disconcerting but at the same time exciting way.

I enter an unimaginable landscape where the people in charge idealize the beginning of a utopian era, that era that I could only read in stories when I was a child, and that with a deep feeling remained only in ideas.

  How important it felt to know that it was only a matter of world organization and some time to start noticing changes, the same ones that started with the visualization of architecture, seeing traditional ideas in the past and being transformed in a better way for a collective, individual, and beneficial use with the environment, which, by the way, has given us truce since the human being has been taking care of it.

It surprises me how far we can go as a civilization when we have a clear goal, for example, in my country (Ecuador), we adapt each city and each climate for a different architectural distribution; we leave aside the prototype homes to give way to the ingenuity to maintain our nature and consciously take over the quality of life of each inhabitant. (Ramadier, 2004).

How interesting it is to live in a space in which concrete cities have disappeared and when I walk through each place, I find something new and surprising, the avenues are adapted for pedestrian use and what we knew as bicycles around 2020, are the form of daily mobilization; if only you could stand next to me and see with pride how a basic means of transportation has developed for decades until today, you would be speechless. 

At this very moment nature rules, and without going too far, the historical centers speak for themselves... you can see big houses like mountains consumed by time, which, at their feet, create a green area where local merchants sell their products in an orderly manner in small stores created with a resistant material to adverse climates like those of my country, also these have a detachable ergonomics and long durability. Thus, without realizing it, architecture has taken us to a new world, but with a past and purpose, full of sensations and improvements.

It is very likely that all this is not living without the help of the rest of humanity; giving way and a potential credit to the culture that excelled in the need for a new form of relationship, maybe you ask me why? Well, we are evolving beings, we adapt to changing customs and organization, politics, as well as architecture, form a great role in this new ¨utopian¨ world that in simple terms has become the reality of many. They shared with us their knowledge both in culture and materiality, and how not to include in the latter the construction and realization of our homes.

CHAPTER 2
Housing and Green Areas in a Utopian Environment
Without realizing it, we move in an environment full of architecture, this is due to what was once the imagination of people who understood the needs of the population as such and transformed them into reality.
In this year full of unforeseen things, we all live at par, fulfilling our expectations and without differentiating by social classes, as it was many years ago. The houses are characterized by wide spaces and great quality of windows that reflect what is happening in this unthinkable world, technology has helped us with quality of life, and even more, to study the new species that inhabit. (Khagram, 2006).

It is because of this, that the way of creating each home was transformed, it is to see wide and ecological patios, flowers with bright and brilliant colors that give life to the warm climate in which I find myself, it is only to take a few steps to understand these wooden giants that generate a green cover with their large leaves; it is to see before everyone how in reality the design is mixed by the human being in conjunction with the glorious vegetable space, the air circulates in a passing way through folding panels that are supported with the required technology. A few hours further are cold and compact areas, where circular figures rule for the use and distribution of heat, it amazes me how being in conjunction with civilization we manage to find in the simplest the right answer to 2100.(Li & Whalley, 2017)

The distribution, construction and care of these architectural typologies becomes the responsibility of each city across the globe, and in this way, maintain a specific order so as not to form a long-term congestion as we saw many years ago due to the automobile sector. In the same way, each material depends on the region and climatic floor, since in times past we did not care about joining the environment... how selfish of us as a civilization to think that a home of four concrete walls located in any sector would be the solution to what the Earth was warning us. However, we understood that this year would generate a significant change and this is how globally this form of realization is given to maintain a sustainable environment. 

Asian architecture is the one who, as a world power, reached out to us to generate a change. Standing in an environment that is perhaps a bit absurd for you, but very important and real for me, has given me the possibility to describe how it works and where it comes from. This concept focuses on immersing oneself in green spaces, with a simple but efficient construction technique that provides that all-important connection with the surroundings.

On the other hand, when talking about the environment, I cannot overlook the new creatures that exist around us. It is a different trophic chain, where large animals capable of purifying oxygen and thus contribute to this wonderful world are preserved; however, they are the reminder and fruit of what at the time was the absolute pollution in which they decided to evolve for survival. The design returns to take part of these spaces in which the human being is being conscious of his care, it is only a matter of imagining it, long and extensive plots built by the humanity full of showy fruits with a reddish color that only these imposing beings can use as food inside the vegetal forest and homes dedicated to the accomplishment of their own species; none is interrupted in their labors inside the ecosystem, and this way, we realized the importance of the care with what surrounds us (Valizadeh et al., 2022).

Ending this wonderful journey full of mystery and nervousness for a new world that shakes our bodies, I want to tell about how amazing it is to walk through the streets of each city I have moved throughout this innovative year. Little by little we all remove the unusable "junk" of ancient civilizations and recycle it into material for the construction of our homes; but as I do so, it is inevitable to walk through each of these places and see streetcars and train tracks consumed by a strange and extravagant vegetation, full of green color ranges and an indescribably hypnotizing aroma, as this is repeated in almost every place. (Dearle et al., 2002).

This is how I begin to understand architecture as an important essence, due to the diseases that we drag over the years, most entrances to both large-scale buildings, as for relatively small size houses is done by ramps due to the affections to the bones that pollution has left us. (Ko et al., 2017)

CHAPTER 3
Utopian and dystopian as one science

While our environment is evidenced in an interesting way in the eyes of the past, it is mixed with dystopia and how it has been controversial with construction and its development. In the early 2030's the planet Earth was going through its second global pandemic, a major depletion of the ozone layer and emission of garbage in quantities no living thing had ever evidenced (Yao et al., 2009).

This affected our skin and organs, in addition to igniting the alert for universal care and understanding. The home of every citizen became the main shelter space, however, this was not efficient due to the bad construction practice we were used to. This is how we arrived at 2100, with sequels of sedentary lifestyles, poor nutrition for years, and finally irreversible ailments within the body of each of us. I look at myself in the mirror and I understand that, within this renewed world, the human being is slowly being consumed as a sign of what we lost in the so acclaimed globalization (Lambert, 2001).

I can only say that I am lucky, I am lucky to admire from afar what I can leave as a legacy, a new way of living with architecture, with its environment, with how an economy can crumble in such a short time, and how the learning of a culture that has remained throughout time could save us from extinction. (Sagan, 1993).

EPILOGUE

In conclusion, the work demonstrates and expresses an idea to the reader as if he were in two worlds and two temporal spaces, it is about understanding the union between the perfect (utopia) and the imperfect (dystopia), understood as a reading in the present (year 2023) but with eyes in the future (2100); where we find a paradise full of beings and unimaginable vegetation, taking into account the quality of life that is generated in the inhabitants and how politics, economics and architecture influence it without neglecting the order and distribution of its functions and zoning within the society of 2100.

In my opinion, I think it is a challenge to reach an inclusive society full of life, where differences disappear and we all collaborate to get closer to the environment that we deserve and have desired with so much desire; often we do not take into account that architecture is part of everything that surrounds us, and thanks to it we can improve as an identity.

REFERENCES

Sagan, C. & Aznar, A. R. (2022). Los dragones del Edén: Especulaciones sobre la evolución de la inteligencia humana (Drakontos). Editorial Crítica.
Ramadier, T. (2004). Transdisciplinarity and its challenges: the case of urban studies. Futures, 36(4), 423-439. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2003.10.009
Khagram, S. (2006). Possible Future Architectures of Global Governance: A Transnational Perspective/Prospective. Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations, 12(1), 97-117. https://doi.org/10.1163/19426720-01201008
Li, C. & Whalley, J. (2017). How close is Asia already to being a trade bloc? Journal of Comparative Economics, 45(4), 847-864. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jce.2016.08.001

Valizadeh, P., Guzman-Novoa, E. & Goodwin, P. H. (2022). High genetic variability of Nosema ceranae populations in Apis mellifera from East Asia compared to central Asia and the Americas. Biological Invasions, 24(10), 3133-3145. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10530-022-02835-1
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