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Cyberpunk design has been all the rage for several years now \u2014 this very website was once awash in neon colors<\/a> and hard edges, you might recall \u2014 but Figma CEO Dylan Field says he sees glimmers of optimism taking over. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cI think that we were really futurist, really cyberpunk for a while,\u201d the founder of the popular design tool company told the crowd at a live taping of Decoder<\/em> at SXSW<\/a> when asked to compare the Cybertruck with the just-announced Rivian R3<\/a>. \u201cA lot of neon lines, a lot of hard edges, a lot of poly or low-poly sort of metaphors. And it feels like we\u2019re going more humanist. It feels like we\u2019re going maybe more solarpunk.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Solarpunk has been around for a few years now<\/a> \u2014 long enough that the conservative American Enterprise Institute wrote an entire blog post<\/a> about how it\u2019s a dangerous liberal fantasy somehow tied to AOC! \u2014 and it usually looks like Tears of the Kingdom<\/em> fan art. Think abundant energy, organic shapes, greenery embedded into architecture. Think… Emma Watson posting about hopeful futures to her Instagram in 2021:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cCyberpunk is dystopia \u2014 everything\u2019s metal and concrete and low poly. It\u2019s kind of depressing, but it\u2019s also got that edge to it. Whereas solarpunk is more natural, the architecture is blending with the environment,\u201d Field said. \u201cI think it\u2019s still a vision of the future, but also it\u2019s more human and it\u2019s got a lot of curves. It\u2019s blended into the environment more, rather than trying to stand out as a piece of technology or a piece of architecture.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n It certainly seems like cuter, friendlier designs have been capturing a lot of attention recently \u2014 the Rabbit R1<\/a> was the hit of CES, for example. But whether it all adds up to \u201csolarpunk\u201d or just cool retro-ish design… well, you just let us know in the comments.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n