Speculative Futures
November 17, Kudan House
Speculative Futures
A forum for consequential imagination
One day.
A shared room.
Where futures are tested, not imagined.
Presented by semi permanent x teenage engineering, Speculative Futures brings builders across disciplines into closer proximity to examine what comes next through Ground Truth, The Human Layer, What Moves Culture First, and Physical Proof.
Not prediction.
Consequence.
Good questions deserve good food.
Chefs Jesús Durón and Ryo Haga are dreaming up delectable bites and lunch for our day together at Speculative Futures. A little nourishment between conversations, and another reason to gather around the table.
Come curious. Come hungry.
Agenda
Speculative Futures unfolds through five connected conversations, moving from the places we inhabit to human agency, the organizations we build, the cultures we shape, and the physical consequences of our ideas.
Opening and shared intentions
Sandeep Pahuja welcomes the room and sets the conditions for a day of listening, questioning, and exchange.
Ground truth
How do environments, cities, infrastructures, and atmospheres shape the ways we live, gather, move, and imagine?
The human layer
As intelligence becomes more capable and embedded in daily life, how do we preserve agency, build trust, and remain attentive to human experience?
The working layer
What changes when intelligence enters our work? A conversation about organizational authority, incentives, experimentation, and the financial and business models that determine which ideas become practice.
What moves culture first
Before change becomes widely understood, it often finds expression through music, media, subculture, taste, and creative practice. How do we recognize these signals, and what responsibility comes with amplifying them?
AgeTechX / Longer lives, new questions
An open conversation on longevity, demographic change, and how we might rethink work, learning, care, and belonging. Details in development.
Physical proof / Building the future
Ideas meet their consequences through tools, materials, food systems, machines, and exploration beyond Earth. What does making something real reveal about whether it is worth building?
Closing reflection
Sandeep brings the day’s conversations together around three questions: What should we protect? What should we test? What should we refuse?
Throughout the day, shared meals and breaks make room for conversations to continue. Lunch also offers an optional Monster Workshop with Dylan Sisson.
Explore the latest agenda:
semipermanent.com
Speculative Futures Passport
US$990 including 10% Japan Consumption Tax
US$900 before tax
For practitioners working across architecture, design, technology, science, culture, cities, business, research, and public life, and for those building, questioning, and testing what comes next.
Your Passport includes
Full access on November 17
General seating and access to the complete Speculative Futures program at Soho House Tokyo.
Conversations and curated throughlines
A cross-disciplinary forum examining environments, intelligence, culture, design, science, society, and the consequences of what we choose to build.
Around the table
Lunch and thoughtful bites throughout the day, prepared by Chefs Jesús Durón and Ryo Haga. Dietary requirements can be shared during checkout.
Included
Kit
A bespoke, curated offering created specifically for those in the room.
Because the gathering does not end when the program does. It simply finds a new table.
Basecamp
A home for the curious. WPÜ Shinjuku, our Official Community Hotel Partner, is the everyday living room of Tokyo Salone.
Passport holders will receive a private community room rate and booking details after purchasing their ticket. Rooms are subject to availability, so we recommend booking early.
Gather over coffee, music, and conversation. Drop in, meet someone new, or simply make yourself at home. Some of the best conversations begin here.
Explore
Tokyo Salone and Speculative Futures are only the beginning.
Together with Kammui, our Official Japan Experience Partner, discover a deeper Japan through thoughtfully curated journeys, regional explorations, local introductions, and unforgettable side quests.
Experience Japan through the people, places, and stories that rarely appear on a map.
The Speculative Futures Passport is more than entry. It is an invitation to examine what is emerging, challenge what feels inevitable, and take part in deciding what is worth building.
Not simply a seat in the audience.
A place within the inquiry.
Ground truth. Human agency. Physical proof.
Come ready to question, contribute, and engage.
Invoices are available for workplace reimbursement upon request.
Venue
Kudan House
Built in 1927 as the Yamaguchi family residence, Kudan House brings nearly a century of architectural history into contemporary Tokyo. Set in the Kudan district, its Spanish-style architecture, intimate rooms, and garden now provide a setting for creative exchange, connecting the house's life with new ideas and relationships.
Within the Tokyo Salone constellation, Kudan House hosts this year’s Speculative Futures. Here, we gather across disciplines to explore how emerging ideas become the systems, objects, and cultures we live with, and consider what is worth carrying forward.
Explore the constellation
Tokyo Salone, Nourish
Intentionally limited.
A place in the room has been held for you.
We’ll meet you in Tokyo.
Constellation
Speculative Futures is part of Tokyo Salone, a constellation unfolding across restaurants, galleries, studios, workshops, cafés, gardens, listening rooms, hotels, kitchens, cultural institutions, and unexpected spaces throughout Tokyo and Kyoto.
Every place shapes the conversations it hosts. Together, the cities become our campus.
Semi Permanent community list
Instagram & Threads
Facebook
LinkedIn
Code of Conduct,
Commercial Disclosure,
and Media Release
Partnering with Tokyo Salone
Tokyo Salone is built for the long term. Rather than sponsoring a single event, our partners become part of an evolving cultural institution connecting global creative communities with Japan.