Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Just ship my home!

3 reasons why containers are a housing solution.

Not even five years ago, students from Amsterdam got the opportunity to live in containers. The city of Amsterdam had a major housing problem for students. They had to live in old attics and pay high rent for areas that often lacked basic needs. Amsterdam had to find a solution and fast.The municipality was looking for housing that could be built fast for a relatively low price. The number of individual dwellings had to be high as well because there were many students looking for housing.
The solution they found was shipping containers, developed by the company Tempo Housing. A shipping container has a standard dimension (width 2.4m and long 12m). At the moment millions of shipping containers are not being used in ports, so the company wouldn’t have a problem there. Every unit/container has a surface of 28.8m2, which isn't big but is a good living standard for students. Tempo Housing has various designs for different needs but every container comes with a kitchen, bathroom and living room. Large windows provide sufficient daylight and every container has good insulation to protect it from heat/cold, noise and fire. The ducts and pipes for ventilation, sewage, water and heating/cooling and the wiring for power and data all come together in a central service shaft in the middle of the unit, next to the bathroom. Every few containers, there is one container that connects all these services and leads it to the main network of the city. The containers are very strong and very suitable for stacking.
According to one municipality (Noordwijk), in the Netherlands the price is around €1000 per m2. That is € 28,800 per house. This is including the installation of the containers and the connection to electricity and the sewer system. The housing company requires that the containers be purchased in groups of 50, after which the buyer can rent out the individual units. Maybe the most amazing thing is that they can deliver the final product in 11 weeks. Of course those prices are developed for a Dutch market, so this will vary in other countries.

More information can be found on:http://www.tempohousing.com/

Monday, November 16, 2009

SPACEBLOCK - architectural solution for human poverty


Spaceblock is in search of a flexible housing solution that could be used in several Third World countries. It’s result is a simple prefabricated building system which offers a spatial structure that is based upon an individual prefab module. It offers the possibility to claim this little spot and express its identity. Every person is unique and longing for his own little part in the bigger picture. This is the starting point of each Spaceblock-design.

The flexible system can be used as temporarily (slum)housing and small street enterprises, but even bigger structures can be made. In Chennai, one of India’s mega cities, a shelter for 120 street children is designed with this system. Hopefully this pilot project will be the first in a wide range.
Spaceblock is still in its initial stage and needs to be carried by different people and companies. Maybe you or your company can help!

If you’re interested in being a part of this process, please send an email to marco@space-block.com.

There’s more about this unique project on http://www.space-block.com/.

Monday, November 9, 2009

Ironic: An eco-housing project depends on waste increase

Although many people may think that the success of Ingrid Vaca's housing method depends on waste increase, we rather think it's the opposite. For the OS-house, the success depends only on a focus change. Granted, an empty bottle lying on the street it's waste. But if it's added to a new life cycle, it will turn out be a useful resource.

For example, during 2008 the world consumed 200 billion liters of bottled water. If we consider an average consume of 1-liter bottles, plus the 25,000 plastic bottles needed to build one single eco-house, the housing industry would be building 8 million new homes per year while getting rid of tonnes of polluting waste.

That's why Ingrid's initiative of turning waste into a resource is absolutely needed. Moreover, from incubation till completion, her method is 100% feasible. And viable initiatives are the ones truly needed to overcome housing problems in developing countries.

For this reason, the OS-house launches the Design Competition in January 2010. Each participant will have to design a modular house that is both affordable and sustainable for its future residents. The best design will build in a pilot project in Ghana, and just as Ingrid's eco-housing idea, that design will change the life of those who really need it.

How to build a sustainable home with 15,456 plastic bottles

In the little town of Santa Cruz de la Sierra in Bolivia, empty plastic bottles lying on the streets are being collected and used as house bricks. Ingrid Vaca Diez is a hands-on Bolivian woman who reuses plastic and glass bottles to build sustainable and affordable homes. Her enthusiasm and creativity already changed the reality of life of many families.

Although for us it's impossible to figure out how could Ingrid – a lawyer – come up with a ground breaking eco-housing solution. For her, it was obvious. She created recycled-affordable bricks by filling empty bottles with a variety of materials, eg, cement, mud, animal feces, sugar mixed with straw and sand. Simply put. And once Ingrid realized that her method was feasible, she decided to target this housing alternative to large families living in extreme poverty. The very first house became reality in 2007; it's a 120m2 building made of 15,456 plastic bottles.

After succeeding in her first two eco-housing attempts, Ingrid's method brought kindred souls together, and nowadays they are almost done with the third house; with many more to come.

In short, Ingrid's eco-housing method not only builds homes to those in true need but also turns human waste into a resource. In other words, Ingrid's straightforward innovation confirms that affordability and sustainability can live under the same roof.

Researching in Ghana (III)


"It's absolutely necessary to have Ghanians' participation and collaboration during all the stages of the project"- Samson Nibi.

For 4 weeks Samson did a lot of research, had a couple of appointments and gave various seminars to more than 500 students. For the Open Source House project this trip was very important. Samson gathered some relevant information about the needs of the prospective home owners. He also found two organizations to commit to the implementing action once the designs are ready.


Everybody gets excited
More than 500 hundred students attended the seminars, this shows how great their interest is in this project. As well as the students the government showed great interest in this project. Because of all the enthusiastic reactions Samson received he is convinced that Open Source House is going the be a great success.

The market is open for os-house!

Samson Nibi:
Getting back I was very tired but satisfied. I traveled thousands of kilometers to meet with people in the housing sector, at local, regional and national level. From the lowest to the highest level of government representation they were enthusiastic about os-house and received us with arms wide open. Even the prospective architects at the universities are looking forward to have some influence in the way the housing market will develop in the future. And I must add, sustainable housing is a hot topic.


Research in Ghana (II)
Research in Ghana (I)