The Green Shade of the Future

Background
The Green Shade of the Future was a projection mapping work screened on the exterior wall of EXPO Hall “Shining Hat” during Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai, Japan. According to the official Expo 2025 website, projection mapping works were shown every night on the exterior walls of EXPO Hall “Shining Hat”, including invited films and selected works from countries and regions around the world that expressed hopes and visions for the future.
Public sources also state that a total of 109 original artworks were showcased, including 41 works from Japan and 68 works from overseas, representing 28 countries and regions.  The EXPO Hall itself served as a major event venue at Expo 2025, and after dusk its outer wall became a large-scale projection mapping surface. 
The work uses the image of a tree and its shade as a metaphor for future society. Inspired by the idea that one generation plants a tree for the next to enjoy its shade, the concept connects technological progress, intergenerational inheritance, and a more harmonious future. From ancient tools to future transportation and inclusive technologies, the work imagines how human innovation can grow like a tree, supporting the needs of different people across generations.

Design Problem
The main challenge of this project was to communicate a clear and poetic idea through a large-scale projection work shown in a public environment. The design needed to address several key issues:

The visuals had to remain recognisable when projected onto a large architectural surface
The concept needed to be understood within a short viewing time
The work had to communicate optimism, future thinking, and universal values
The visual language needed to be accessible to audiences from different cultural backgrounds
The design had to balance technology, nature, human progress, and emotional storytelling

The core challenge was to transform the abstract ideas of technological development, generational legacy, and inclusive future living into a visual narrative that could be felt immediately by a public audience.

Design Positioning
The project was positioned around the concept of “the green shade of the future.” The tree became the central visual metaphor: its roots symbolise the foundations built by previous generations, its growth represents technological progress, and its shade suggests the benefits enjoyed by future generations.
The visual narrative can be understood through three layers. The first layer focuses on planting and roots, representing past effort and inherited knowledge. The second layer shows growth and transformation, expressing the development of tools, systems, and technologies. The third layer presents shade, harmony, and future life, imagining a society where transportation and tools respond to the diverse needs of different people.
Rather than presenting technology as something cold or mechanical, the work frames progress through warmth, nature, and care. Green tones, light, branches, flowing lines, and growth-like motion were used as key visual directions to create a poetic connection between nature and future society.

Conclusion
The Green Shade of the Future translates the idea of “one generation planting a tree for the next” into a visual story about technology, inheritance, and hope. The work suggests that future innovation should not only advance systems and tools, but also support more inclusive, harmonious, and human-centred ways of living.
As a projection mapping work screened in an international Expo setting, the project brought a personal creative concept into a large public context. Through architecture, light, motion, and symbolic storytelling, it invited viewers to imagine a future where technology grows with care and provides shade for the generations to come.