This Advanced Studio taught in Fall 2019 shares a title with a canonical Marx quote, “All that is solid melts inti air.” The same quote was appropriated for the title of a Marxist/humanist manifesto by Marshall Berman that positions Modernism as a state of flux and ambiguity. Though the studio is initiated with intense skills-based inquiry into computational methods, the pedagogy equally prioritizes the critical, theoretical and speculative. The first of four prompts, (each of which posits a hybrid condition) invites students to consider the state of being in-between figure and field. The second asks students to consider an element that is in-between particle and object. In response to the third prompt, students consider an element that is between solid and surface. The fourth and final prompt provokes students to design a building by considering the hybridization of atmosphere and enclosure. We operate through the term under the assumption that stepping into the realm of speculative fiction need not lead to the abdication of the social, ethical or political concerns of the architect. On the contrary, the prompts are designed to invite earnest engagement of an aesthetically refined, speculative work of architecture that frames representation, image, experience, and effect in terms of big existential, epistemological and disciplinary questions. Some student work is posted on Instagram with the tag #solidIntoAir