MIT is opening its labs, theaters and a newly renovated warehouse to the public this week for MIT Future Fest, a five-day festival of science, technology, art and design.
The festival begins Wednesday, Sept. 30, and runs through Sunday, Oct. 4. The festival’s website says passes have sold out, but some events remain free and open to the public.
The MIT Museum is offering free admission all week. MIT’s new design hub, the MET Warehouse, opens to the public Saturday, and the Cambridge Science Carnival, also free, returns Sunday.
The festival is led by the MIT Museum with MIT Technology Review and the MIT Morningside Academy for Design. It is sponsored by the city of Cambridge and the Cambridge Office for Tourism, among others.
According to the festival website, it includes more than 100 participants across AI, robotics, climate, health and life sciences. Events and panels will take place around campus.
MIT Museum Director Michael John Gorman said the festival is meant as a response to a bleak moment.
“We are caught in a doom-cycle, often struggling to imagine alternative futures,” Gorman said in a statement. “MIT Future Fest exists because right now we need to open up our campus to the world and show what’s possible.”
“With universities under attack and science itself in doubt, we felt it was important to create a moment of creative optimism and catalyze the conversations we urgently need about our shared future,” the statement said.
The festival opens Wednesday at 3:30 p.m. with a panel called “The Future Starts Here.”
Gov. Maura Healey, MIT President Sally Kornbluth and other speakers will discuss how public, private and educational institutions can work together to sustain student talent and innovation.
“Massachusetts is where the future is being invented, and MIT Future Fest is a chance to showcase our leadership in technology and design to the world,” Healey said in a news release.
Healey’s administration has committed $25 million to a new Quantum Systems Laboratory at MIT and launched an initiative to protect scientific research and jobs threatened by federal cuts, the release said.
Also Wednesday, the museum opens “Sensing Oceans,” immersive installations by the London-based art collective Marshmallow Laser Feast.
The Met Warehouse, the new home of MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning, is open Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The Science Carnival runs noon to 4 p.m. on Sunday with more than 100 hands-on activities, including a Robot Petting Zoo.
Drop-in installations include “Ocean of Dreams,” which turns Kendall Square Plaza into a “living, dreaming ocean,” Wednesday through Saturday evenings. “Play the Green” is a 200-foot-tall Tetris game on the Green Building.
More than 100 speakers are scheduled, including Nobel laureate Daron Acemoglu, Museum of Modern Art curator Paola Antonelli and architect Carlo Ratti. Full programming is at mitfuturefest.org
This story is part of a partnership between Cambridge Day and the Boston University Department of Journalism.
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