The inflatable moment

the long version

"In the turbulent year 1968, student protests in Paris and around the world challenged established authority. To a group of architecture students at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts calling themselves Utopie, the idea of the inflatable held a promise of mobility, movement, energy, and escape. Strongly influenced by American military technology and comic books - as well as by the work of Buckminster Fuller, Henrl Lefebvre, Jean Baudrillard, and London's Archigram - the Utopie group envisioned an ideal world of pneumatic furniture, structures, and environments." "While the Utopie architects were unable to realize their dream of a society literally built on air, their fanciful, exuberant, witty, and highly detailed drawings remain some of the most extraordinary in modern architecture.". "The Inflatable Moment documents this collision of architectural, social, and political forces. It presents a complete, annotated catalog of the designs of the Utopie architects, showcased along with other inflatable experiments of the period: recent reflections from the three architects."--BOOK JACKET.