The late, great Iain M. Banks taunted his devoted readers for years with glorious images of billion-strong space colonies hurtling through the abyss. Before him it was 2001: A Space Odyssey, all the way back to Edward Hale's 'Brick Moon' in 1889.
But it's not just sci-fi authors and futurists. Even Nasa has been teasing us for years with dreams and concepts of building colonies in space.
Of course, we can't criticise them too much since in the end they did actually build one. However, while the space station is cool, it's not quite massive-ring-forest-city cool.
Space.com has provided us with this amazing infographic of Nasa's history of space station concepts. Check it out, and head over to their site for more details about the history of dreaming of cities in the void.