Long before the cubicle became a symbol of corporate drudgery, it was meant to be a utopia. In this episode, we trace the surprising rise—and spectacular distortion—of the office cubicle, born in 1968 from Robert Propst’s vision of flexibility, mobility, and human-centered design. Companies quickly twisted that dream into dense grids of 90-degree boxes built for one purpose: packing in as many workers as possible. We explore how this cost-cutting compromise reshaped office life for decades, fueling stress, poor ventilation, spreading infections, and offering neither privacy nor the freedom of open-plan layouts. And as workplaces rethink design in the age of mobile tech, we ask: are new concepts like the “Living Office” finally correcting Propst’s broken legacy, or are we just reinventing the same old box?

https://www.economist.com/international/2014/12/30/inside-the-box