Winston Churchill said "We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us." And this holds true for our cities as well. The intent of this thesis is to develop an understanding of the origins of the city, historic theories of planning, Utopian proposals, the current state of the city, and what the future the city may hold.

The City of Aetheria is a world created via poetic imagination, the sublime product of mental activity; as a study intent is to discover the fundamental principles of the city, making explicit the nature and significance of fundamental concepts of urban design theories and utopian ideals while demonstrating the elements of urban form and the effects of urban process through history. Incorporating historical archetypes and typologies of architectural form; the design of the City of Aetheria was an investigational tool to study the Image, Form and Elements of the city.