London-based firm Zaha Hadid Architects to build a Virtual City for the Metaverse led by principal architects Patrik Schumacher, Mytaverse’s Kenneth Landau, and Jaime Lopez, who are designing the self-governed city.
“The time is ripe, technologically, economically and socially, for shifting more and more of our productive lives into the metaverse. The metaverse is just starting to show its potential to empower true global collaboration with global borderless participation”, said Schumacher.
A municipal hall, collaborative working spaces, and even galleries selling NFTs will all embrace ZHA’s trademark aesthetic. The Free Republic of Liberland, a 2.7-mile-long micronation between Serbia and Croatia founded in 2015 by Czech politician Vit Jedlickaback, whose government advocates libertarian views, is the city’s name. However, due to a lack of actual infrastructure, no one lives there, including Jedlickaback.
Because it is built on decentralized and autonomous blockchain technology, Liberland—a country with a libertarian government and few rules and regulations—resonates with the metaverse. After all, those features, as well as its lightning speed, are only a few of the reasons why people are drawn to cryptocurrencies. For example, El Salvador has become the first country in the world to formally adopt bitcoin as legal tender after Congress approved President Nayib Bukele’s proposal to embrace the cryptocurrency.
“The main thrust of the design is to utilize the congeniality of our architecture with the user experience, and adapt our design ethos and methods to address the specific opportunities and constraints offered by the virtual realm. Metaverse provided their innovative and proprietary V.R. interaction technology that enables the virtual use of the spaces”, Schumacher says.
Hovering rooftops, huge interiors with no need to consider energy efficiency, and auditoriums that expand and shrink dependent on the number of users in them are some of the aspects of the Zaha Hadid Architects’ metaverse. Though the metaverse is still in its infancy, Schumacher believes that as the world adjusts to the digital realm that the epidemic effectively thrust everyone into, virtual cities will become more popular.
“The explosion of entrepreneurial and technological creativity in the crypto-ecosystem demonstrates what would be possible if the degrees of freedom that still persist there would be generalized. We want and need more freedom now, and this can only be achieved by starting fresh with a coalition of enthusiasts and without infringing on incumbent interests”, Schumacher added.
Recently as well Saudi Kindi architects have partnered with Netvrk to create their own metaverse city as well.
