Roy Mason

Who was Roy Mason?

Roy Mason was an American lecturer, writer, and futuristic architect who designed and built a variety of futuristic homes and other buildings in the 1970s and 1980s using low cost materials and alternative energy sources. Always forward looking, in 1978 Mason created plans for a fifty home community of solar powered houses in Columbia, Maryland that was to be called "Solar Village". Mason invented architronics which was exemplified in his Xanadu homes. Mason was a founding member of the World Future Society, the publisher of Futurist Magazine. He also co-designed their first logo. In the 1980s Mason was the architecture editor of the Futurist Magazine. He was also the first executive director of the Home Automation Association.

Mason was very interested in modern education. He designed a sprayed foam building for an experimental college called College of the Potomac in Paris, Va. in 1971. He also donated his time and talents to the Capital Children's Museum in Washington DC where he created several forward looking exhibits.

In 1996, at age 57, Roy Mason was killed by his lover in his Capitol Hill townhouse. Mason worked and lived most of his life in and around Washington, DC.