Before “wearables” were a thing—before they were even a glimmer in Google Glass’s lenses—Lisa Krohn ’85 designed a pliable wrist computer (1988) and, in 1993—an era of boxy beige desktops with 4 MB of RAM—the striking Cyberdesk. Based on speculative tech, it included a retinal display, neural port, and a necklace-like keyboard. The Society for the History of Technology’s 2023 meeting invited Krohn—an art/architecture Brown/RISD grad who now practices and teaches design in California—to discuss how she would update the design with curators from the likes of Cooper Hewitt and Smithsonian Design Museum (both have Cyberdesk prototypes in their collections). Cyberdesk 2.0 looks like a sleek pair of wraparound aviators but can monitor brainwaves, hydration, and stress levels.
