Design in Fiction

Usages as envisioned in futuristic tales

Our everyday habits in fiction

Futuristic tales emerge, well beyond their status as pieces of literature or entertainment, as living embodiments of possible alternate realities: limitations that are alien to us, diverging socio economic philosophies, non-existent natural environments, immeasurable distances, variable gravities, etc.



Literature, comics, films, and TV series make up our field of research. These futuristic tales allow us to imagine worlds other than our own, and to experience new habits and usages within them!



Here, we attempt to link together everyday usages, as they have been presented in futuristic stories. Inhabiting, caring for oneself, eating, working, and moving around...such are the many everyday habits that are reflected in future-focused tales often in (excessively) similar ways. Could it be that our imaginary visions have failed?

The future of work

An original composition by RF Studio
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After Earth, 2013 - Night Shyamalan • Altered Carbon, 2018 - Nick Hurran • Avatar, 2009 - James Cameron • Black Mirror, 2016 - Dan Trachtenberg • Cloud Atlas, 2013 - Lana & Lilly Wachowski • I Am Mother, 2019 - Grant Sputore • Minority Report, 2002 - Steven Spielberg • Osmosis, 2019 - Julius Berg • Prometheus, 2012 - Ridley Scott • Pumzi, 2009 - Wanuri Kahiu • TAU, 2018 - Federico D'Alessandro

The future of medicine

An original composition by RF Studio
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Ad vitam, 2018 - Thomas Cailley & Sébatien Mounier • Altered Carbon, 2018 - Laeta Kalogridis • Akira, 1988 - Katsuhiro Ōtomo • Matrix, 1999 - Lana & Lilly Wachowski • Elysium, 2013 - Neill Blomkamp • Passenger, 2016 - Morten Tyldum • Prometheus, 2012 - Ridley Scott • Star Wars : Episode V, 1980 - Irvin Kershner • Star Wars : Episode VIII, 2017 - Rian Johnson

Anticipating issues

Anticipation fictions are speculations about worlds that could be. They reveal the issues of today. They function as a distorting mirror of our realities by extrapolating consequences. They are often considered as firewalls, warnings in order to take a critical look at certain changes in our way of being in the world. They often also function as tools - education or acceptance - in the face of anticipated issues.



We therefore put together extracts from fictions which, for us as designers, illustrate the issues which are now essential to respond to the challenges that are ours: alternative realities, rating society, human augmentation, design of the living, agency of the machine.

Artificial animals

An original composition by RF Studio
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Black Mirror, 2017 - James Hawes • Blade Runner, 1982 - Ridley Scott • Jurassic Park, 1993 - Steven Spielberg • Okja, 2017 - Bong Joon-ho • Westworld, 2016 - Jonny Campbell

Augmented human

An original composition by RF Studio
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A.I. Artificial Intelligence, 2001 - Steven Spielberg • Altered carbon, 2018 - Laeta Kalogridis • La cité des enfants perdus, 1995 - Marc Caro & Jean-Pierre Jeunet • Years and years, 2019 - Russell T Davies

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