Megastructures: The Visual Encyclopedia By: Neil Blevins

Author: Neil Blevins

In the mid 70s, inspired by the first moon landing, excitement about space travel and exploration had reached an all time high. Scientists made proposals and plans for projects such as asteroid mining, a base on the moon, and man’s settlement of space in giant orbiting habitats. Sadly, these grand plans were abandoned as the world’s population focused their attention elsewhere, and the spark of humanity’s journey to the stars almost blew out.

But the last 10 years or so have been a rekindling of that flame, thanks to spaceships landing on comets, the flyby of Pluto, and private companies like Space X. The idea of humans moving to the stars has returned to the public discourse. High time we think to bring back some of these older projects and give them o more modern spin.

This book is an encyclopedia of sorts, describing through words and paintings the megastructures that humans could potentially build in the near future, all the way to projects that would take millennia to complete. From giant city scale projects to structures the size of solar systems. Dyson Spheres, Ringworlds, O’Neill Cylinders and Arcologies, 40 structure in all.

The hope for this book is to help inspire the current and next generation to pursue the dream. As well as taking better care of our fragile home, it’s time to push out into space, and explore a brighter future for all of humanity. Let’s move our species forward to achieve our greatest potential.