EXHIBIT OR DISPLAY
Netherlands
THEME: Common Ground
SIZE: 1,157 m²
ENTRANT: Tellart, tellart.com
DESIGN: Tellart, RAU Architects
FABRICATION: Tellart
ADDITIONAL CONTRIBUTORS: Tellart, RAU Architects, DGMR, Asanuma

A thousand invisible threads tie us to other human beings, but rarely do we truly notice how our fates are knitted together. Taking place inside the Netherlands pavilion's central sphere, the film "A New Dawn" used sweeping 360-degree visuals inside the dome to critique humanity's abuse of its diminishing resources. Submerging viewers in stark, almost dystopian scenarios of environmental stress, the AI-generated movie also spotlighted Dutch innovations — such as hydropower harvesting and water-based energy storage — that offered solutions. More important than the right technology, it implied, was the right mindset, of finding common ground that will determine whether we flourish or fail. The interactive Energy Orbs guests carried throughout the pavilion flared at the film's climax with a violet light, physically connecting participants in a way that needed no words to symbolize that together we have the power to create a sustainable future.


EXTERIOR DESIGN
Austria
THEME: Composing the Future
SIZE: 481 m²
ENTRANT: Facts and Fiction GmbH, www.factsfiction.de/en
DESIGN: BWM Designers and Architects
FABRICATION: NUSSLI Group
ADDITIONAL CONTRIBUTORS: Kling Klang Klong, Mozarteum Salzburg and Elisabeth Gutjahr, Grosse8, Zone Media, Werkraum Ingenieure ZT GmbH, Graf Holztechnik, Shinohara, Dream Design Factory, Bewunder

After Johann Strauss adapted “The Blue Danube” into a completely orchestral version for the 1867 World Expo in Paris, it became the Austrian composer's most beloved work and helped earn him the title of the “waltz king.” Almost 160 years later, the Austrian pavilion — knowing most Japanese associate Austria with classical music — paid homage to that history with a spiral-shaped structure in the unmistakable form of a musical note aptly themed “Composing the Future.” Rising more than 50 feet, the structure's approximately 300-by-14-foot ribbon had an inner surface designed as an iconic musical staff: the opening bars of Beethoven's “Ode to Joy.” The bare timber construction — made from certified Austrian spruce — used screwed wooden slats instead of glue that rendered the pavilion easy to dismantle and ultimately reuse, hitting the right notes of climate friendliness and sustainability.




INTERPRETATION OF THEME
Uzbekistan
THEME: Garden of Knowledge
SIZE: 1,272 m²
ENTRANT: Atelier Brückner, atelier-brueckner.com
DESIGN: Atelier Brückner
FABRICATION: NUSSLI Group
ADDITIONAL CONTRIBUTORS: Medienprojekt p2, KLEE Technisches Planungsbüro, Tamschick Media+Space

R Rooted in its cultural heritage and reinterpreted in timber, brick and clay, the Uzbekistan Pavilion expressed the Expo theme — “Designing Future Society for Our Lives” — through a deep-focused lens of sustainability. The pavilion's exterior walls combined clay from Awajishima island and reclaimed bricks from demolished buildings in Japan. Inside, the level of light was set to “dusk” where guests encountered thematic exhibitions using elegant-as-lace models that glowed like bioluminescent life forms. The exhibits focused on the country's rapid transition to a green economy, including projects to restore the devasted Aral Sea region. With the deftness of a ninja, the floor underneath attendees stealthily rose, until finally opening up into the rooftop forest of “trees” made of Osugi cedar, a softwood harvested from nine forests around Osaka. Not just preaching change but practicing it, the pavilion will be dissembled and reconstructed in Uzbekistan.




PRESENTATION
Austria
THEME: Composing the Future
SIZE: 481 m²
ENTRANT: Facts and Fiction GmbH, www.factsfiction.de/en
DESIGN: BWM Designers and Architects
FABRICATION: Nüssli
ADDITIONAL CONTRIBUTORS: Kling Klang Klong, Mozarteum Salzburg and Elisabeth Gutjahr, Grosse8, Zone Media, Werkraum Ingenieure ZT GmbH, Graf Holztechnik, Shinohara, Dream Design Factory, Bewunder

The opening notes of Beethoven's “Ode to Joy” on the Austrian pavilion's exterior were just the overture to even grander, three-room-long composition inside. After passing by the melodic veneer, visitors stepped into a space where all eyes were drawn to a Bösendorfer grand piano, over which hung an original 19th century Lobmeyr chandelier. A tribute to the Bösendorfer piano Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria gifted to Emperor Meiji of Japan in 1869, the 2025 version featured an enlarged version of Hokusai's renowned woodblock print “The Great Wave off Kanagawa” on its lid. Then the lights went low and the piano began playing on its own, as if by invisible hands, a specially composed piece in the style of the Viennese Classic era.

The next room, People and Ideas, featured five prominent Austrian personalities displayed on abstract sheet music, which were actually interactive screens offering edutainment about Austrian innovations. Visitors snapped selfies at two stations also designed to resemble musical notes, which were then converted into portraits similar to the images shown on the other screens using AI. The third and final presentation area, called "Composing the Future," featured a 10-meter-high spiral of sheet music. Here, guests engaged with interactive lecterns to compose music linked to chosen UN Sustainable Development Goals, creating unique AI-powered compositions in real time. Gripping visitors in a spell of notes and chords, what a painter does with a canvas, what magicians do with a wand, Austria did with the sound of music.


STAFF
Kuwait
THEME: Visionary Lighthouse
SIZE: 3,500 m²
ENTRANT: State of Kuwait, Ministry of Information, kuwaitexpo2025.com
DESIGN/FABRICATION: Lava, NUSSLI Group, insglück Gesellschaft für Markeninszenierung mbH (Content Concept and Exhibition Design)

Kuwait treated its staffers as if they might make a lasting impression on Expo attendees—because they did. Even with the pavilion's ambitious architecture of a wing-shaped canopy inspired by desert dunes, coastal winds, and flowing textiles, it was the staff that, instead of the often-default robotic spiels and memorized talking points, made connections that might outlast mere steel and wood. From Osaka to Omaha, no matter where visitors came from, they were greeted not just with sincerity and respect, but also free-flowing conversation. Every encounter was personalized, whether it was making small talk in Japanese, telling someone about Kuwait's geography or cuisine, explaining the exhibits, or perhaps helping to assist those persons with special needs. If often we forget what people say but always remember how they made us feel, the Kuwait staff will linger with attendees as long as there is an Expo.


STAFF UNIFORMS
Saudi Arabia
THEME: An Epic Journey of New Discoveries
SIZE: 3,500 m²
ENTRANT: Saudi Arabia Ministry of Culture, ksaexpo2025.sa
DESIGN: Fosters + Partners
FABRICATION: Tanseisha Co. Ltd
ADDITIONAL CONTRIBUTORS: Ando Hazama, Insignia Worldwide, Squint Opera, 59 Productions, Done + Dusted, THA & Beyond Limits, BeWunder, Tait, TGP International

In the right hands, a uniform can be an entire world sewn into a few yards of thread. After a competition involving 30 different designers, the uniforms of Saudi Arabia's pavilion fused the middle eastern country's cultural heritage with Japanese design principles. Fashioned by two Saudi brands, RealSelf and Al Rashidiya, the attire integrated traditional ornamental motifs, such as engravings seen in the royal Al-Awja Palace and the desert Taif rose, with the minimalist silhouette and structured elegance of the Japanese kimono. The attire's palette drew directly from Saudi Arabia's natural and cultural landscapes, reflecting Saudi Arabia's identity - with earthy tones echoing its terrain, deep green signifying national pride, and gold accents evoking sunsets and Japanese elegance. Made from organic cotton, rayon, and georgette, chosen for their minimal environmental footprint, the uniforms aimed to express who Saudi Arabia is without having to utter a single word.


SUSTAINABLE DESIGN
United Arab Emirates
THEME: Earth to Ether
SIZE: 2,538 m²
ENTRANT: UAE Pavilion Expo 2025 Osaka, 2025.uaepavilionexpo.com/en
DESIGN: Earth to Ether Design Collective
FABRICATION: UAE Expo Office, Atelier Brückner, Rimond, Process Iguchi, Shelter, R/O/U/Y/A, SLA
ADDITIONAL CONTRIBUTORS: Trivandi, Cezars, 3rd Floor Public Relations, BLR

Sustainability is about more than just an end product's green-ness — it's also the journey the product took to get there. To make its pavilion truly sustainable, the United Arab Emirates choreographed an eco-friendly supply chain, sourcing agricultural date palm waste from farmers spanning the Middle East and North Africa. Some four million units of the refuse were transfigured into an enchanted forest of 90 columns, each stretching nearly 46 feet into the sky. Regenerative rather than ornamental, the pavilion's landscaping blended recycled date palm detritus with trees and plants imported from Japanese woodlands. Additionally, the pavilion formulated a masterful waste management plan, including dedicated waste streams, and taking part in in the Expo's circularity market where resources were repeatedly used and ultimately returned to the market for recycling. Even the restaurant abstained from single-use plastics, donated excess food, and relied on compostable serveware.


TECHNOLOGY
Kuwait
THEME: Visionary Lighthouse
SIZE: 3,500 m²
ENTRANT: State of Kuwait, Ministry of Information, kuwaitexpo2025.com
DESIGN/FABRICATION: Lava, NUSSLI Group, insglück Gesellschaft für Markeninszenierung mbH (Content Concept and Exhibition Design)

From motion tracking to mechanically activated projections, technology in the Kuwait pavilion was never an end in itself but a doorway opening onto new worlds, one of connection and hope. In the Visionary Lighthouse, for example, after you voiced a desire into a sinuous Wish Machine, an AI analyzed the melody, tone, and content of your voice and then, in its cyber-forge, shaped a personalized star in real time. Those making a wish could lie down on the undulating dune-like floor and gaze as the elliptical skyscape above them expanded — like a sped-up Big Bang — with their stars, the individual beacons moving and connecting with images of healthy and sustainable lives. The soothing visual experience was accompanied by a soundscape of the guests' recorded voices, combining to reassure us that in a sometimes-chaotic universe, we are not alone.