This is the whitest white in existence today.
It reflects 98% of sunlight.
And soon, we’ll see it covering our cities.
At least that's what the sci-fi movies reckon.
Have you ever noticed that?
2001: A Space Odyssey, Wall-E, Oblivion, Westworld.
They all use white to say “Hey, you’re in the future now.”
But who decided white would be the pigment of tomorrow and why?
It’s a complex history, but here’s our take on the color’s rise to prominence in
design through the 20th century and beyond.
Science fiction writers have made a lot of eerie predictions of the future, some good,
some bad, some hideously bad, and at times it almost seems like they know the future
before any of us.
When we think of a utopian city of the future, filled with advanced technology and towering
skylines, something always stands out.
It's almost always painted white.
White buildings, white interiors, white suspiciously friendly robots.
To understand why this could be our future, we'll have to look back.
Woah too far back!
Sure, we've been using the pigment since way back when we were painting on cave walls,
but it was only after the industrial revolution that white became a permanent part of our
cultural aesthetic.
See, throughout history, ornamentation and detail were the ideal.
Not just anyone could whip up an elaborately decorated spoon, for example.
It was a sign of skillful artisanship and expensive tastes.
But by the industrial age, what was once a symbol of opulence soon became a cheap, mass-produced
redundancy.
Fancy spoons for all!
By the 1920s, aesthetically-minded people were tired of this cheap, manufactured opulence.
I think the fascination with white has been this notion of clean, modern, and something
that sets off the other elements that you do want people to look at.
Architects began to value shape, space and utility over ornamentation.
A clean, white, concrete canvas, highlighting the impeccable form and function of a timeless
structure.
In some cultures, white can symbolize mourning or misfortune.
But in American history, and much of Europe, the color white has typically represented
purity and cleanliness - and darkness, in contrast, was dirty or evil.
Even to this day, the idea of pure, innocent white remains an engine for racist rhetoric
and bigotry that can’t be overlooked.
Making it all the more important to mention Paul Revere Williams.
Or as some called him, "architect to the stars".
In the ‘50s, Williams’ influence on Hollywood's cityscape was clear.
Just take a look at the Theme Building over at LAX.
Designed in the heat of the Space Race, it looks just like a UFO, reflecting America's
post-war fascination with space travel.
And of course, it was white, just like most of the technology NASA was developing.
You see, white reflects the most sunlight, so it protects against UV rays in and especially
outside of our atmosphere.
By absorbing less of the sun’s heat, everything inside is kept cooler.
It's one of the reasons why commercial planes are white.
Astronauts, rockets, the international space station.
Even a lot of the interior is white, which it turns out has its uses inside too.
Bright, illuminating surfaces make it easier to notice when tech needs cleaning or has
points of damage.
This helped further influence the design of futuristic architecture of the mid-20th century.
From Disneyland’s Tomorrowland to Brazil's new capital city Brasilia.
Eventually, white became a staple aesthetic of sci-fi films.
Some sci-fi films, especially ones set in space, use white deliberately to reflect the
isolation of space.
In Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, the ship, Discovery One, was white, just like
what we’d expect to see from NASA.
Other sci-fi minds imagine a dusty, dead future planet, a hyper-saturated corporate space,
or a vast gray metropolis, but a popular choice is the urban utopia of shining white skyscrapers.
In Wall-E, you look at Eve and the rest of the robots all white and shiny, inspired by
the Apple company’s product designs, and it’s like – “yes, that’s the future”.
It’s the next generation of society, where everything’s cleaner, brighter, more advanced.
Hey, this guy looks familiar…
At its core, the presence of white in sci-fi is a departure from the industrial age of
pollution we’ve already lived in towards a universal understanding of progress.
I mean, have you tried keeping a white car clean?
And it seems like all our speculations about the look of the future will actually become
a reality.
Here's why.
It's the pigment in your paint, the protection in your sunscreen, it's even the white in
your toothpaste...
I'm talking about titanium dioxide, and it's the first choice for many of the world's most
famous landmarks.
For the London Eye, they used around 15,000 liters - 4,000 gallons - of titanium dioxide
paint to coat it.
But that's not all titanium dioxide can do...
The Department of Energy confirmed that buildings with external walls painted white absorb less
heat than darker walls.
It’s actually why Santorini in Greece looks the way it does.
Not only that, but the pigment can break down smog particles in the air and turn them into
inert salts, essentially helping a building fight climate change all by itself.
I think a lot of projects are not talking about style or aesthetics.
I think they’re talking about how green can we be, how world-saving can we make ourselves.
Although, it may not be the long-term solution we’ve been looking for...
I’m a little hesitant, ‘cause in 10 years of rain pulling those coatings into our water
and soils, there is some concern that they could be cancer-producing.
So, I think a better question would be what can we do about NOx pollution.
I mean, what can we do to eliminate that?
Professor Xiulin Ruan and his lab designed their own paint as a shining example of what
reflective surfaces can do for our cities.
And so we come to the Whitest White.
The team added barium sulfate, often used to make photo paper, and calcium carbonate,
something you'd find in rocks or shells, to make an even whiter, even more reflective,
even cooler surface.
18 degrees cooler to be precise.
When they tested it in homes, the effects on temperature were on par with air-conditioning.
And considering it's more cost-effective than titanium dioxide, I know a few architects
who might be willing to start using it.
It would be great if everybody just adopted that because at least it would guarantee that
we’re not absorbing heat at a very time we could not afford.
Vivian Loftness co-chairs the steering committee for Smart Surfaces Coalition, a global initiative
that wants to use reflective surface technology in city planning to tackle climate change.
In Mecca, they have these huge umbrellas that, as soon as the sun comes out, start to open,
and when the sun goes down they close again.
And the reason they close again is because those are desert climates and the night sky
is free-cooling.
You don’t want a static, it’s covered all the time, which would trap the heat below.
You want something that folds up and lets you take advantage of a clear night sky, which
you find in most of those desert climates.
Reflectivity, green, and dynamic facades.
I think all three of those things, they should be our modern movement, right.
We dress for the season.
But we don’t dress our buildings for the season.
And, you know, ultimately, if we start to dress them for the season, we’ll dramatically
reduce the demand for energy, but we’ll actually make it more exciting.
Because after all, it's architects that truly decide what our cities of the future will
look like.
Enormous white structures are popping up all over the world.
Japan even has plans for a bright white spaceport city!
Architect Manfredo Tafuri once said that architecture is always about Utopia.
It's aspirational.
With white, reflective surfaces at the forefront of our future cities, it can help create a
cleaner planet and give all those clever sci-fi writers exactly what they asked for.