This paper examines how planetary design is materially enacted through the granular politics of sand. Moving beyond abstract accounts of planetary entanglement, it traces how sand’s trajectories—across extraction zones, supply chains, and reclaimed coastlines—compose volatile and uneven urban futures. Drawing on research in Southeast Asia and the Netherlands, the paper shows how sand operates not merely as a construction input but as a medium of speculation, disruption, and socio-ecological harm. Through the lens of granular configurations, I develop a methodological framework that foregrounds friction, partiality, and multi-temporality in the making and unmaking of environments. This approach unsettles dominant narratives of design as coherent or systemically integrated, revealing instead its contingent, contested, and more-than-human formations. Attending to sand’s granular materiality opens new possibilities for situated, accountable, and reparative practices in an increasingly unstable world.