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Architectural designs and futuristic drawings that provided the vision for the 1939 New York World's Fair are being shown at the Museum of the City of New York. Featured are 40 original illustrations by artists whose job it was to "Build the World of Tomorrow with the Tools of Today."

The 1939 World's Fair was conceived by a group of businessmen in 1936 and brought to fruition by a committee led by historian Lewis Mumford, with the intention of avoiding the traditional focus on advances in technology in favor of exhibits of genuine social value. The Board of Design was set up to oversee the planning and to integrate the varied influences into a visually harmonious whole. While major projects were matched with well-known architects, there also was a completion for "the design of a typical building."

The Fairs design team included four official delineators whose job it was to present visually alluring drawings of the architects' conception. One of the most important designs is an early study of the Theme Center, rendered by urban visionary Hugh Ferriss. The rich charcoal drawing depicts the Trylon, Perisphere, and Helicline designed by architects Wallace K. Harrison and J. Andre Fouilhoux, who were commissioned in 1936 to design the Theme Center. According to Harrison, "We considered a tower 1,500 feet high; we thought of building a cluster of bowls for open air exhibits; we would show the movement of the planets; we conceived of towers on top of balls and balls on top of towers...."

Also on view is a rendering of the Chrysler Motors Building, designed by architect James Gamble Rogers. The building contained the focal exhibit for the Transportation Zone and depicted the story of transportation through history, emphasizing the fact that the world has grown steadily smaller, with its people drawn closer together by improved methods of transportation on land, sea, and in the air.

One of many extraordinary designs is the proposed Micromegas building by the Austrian emigre artist Frank Rudolph Paul. This fantastical...