Curved plank flooring

Against the Grain

Your eyes do not deceive you—these planks are anything but straight and narrow. Contoured to capture the irregularities of wood, I find the design intriguing and appealing in a universe of sameness. The flooring is available in five species; fumed oak is featured here. waldilla.eu

Merrill Environmental Center: the Greenest Building Ever?

by Bridgette Meinhold

 

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation's Headquarters located outside of Annapolis, MD is considered by many to be one of the greenest buildings ever built. Completed back in 2000, the Merrill Environmental Center was the first building to achieve LEED Platinum under USGBC's version 1.0 rating system. Boasting heaps of green building strategies and eco-friendly materials, the building backs up its eco credentials by completing building commissioning and building performance studies to ensure it is operating according to its design standards. The center uses almost 60% less energy and 90% less water than a typical office building built around that same time.

Read more: Merrill Environmental Center: the Greenest Building Ever? | Inhabitat - Green Design Will Save the World 

Rainwater is collected from the Merrill Environmental Center’s roofs and is stored in three large exposed cisterns that supply about 84% of the office’s water needs. A 2 kW solar system on the roof supplies solar energy, while a geothermal heat pump provides energy to efficiently heat and cool the office. Solar passive design, natural ventilation, daylighting, tight insulation and low-e windows also play a big role in the energy-efficient design. The CBF headquarters use 59% less energy than other office buildings this size, which was determined during a year long testing and monitoring phase after the building was commissioned in 2001.

Environmentally-friendly materials were used throughout the building, including recycled-content materials like galvanized steel siding and roofing and reclaimed concrete, acoustic ceiling tiles, interior fabrics, and rubber flooring. The timber post and beam construction utilizes engineered scrap and new-growth FSC-certified wood and SIP panels for the roof and wall enclosures. Additionally, interior finishes included bamboo and cork flooring and reclaimed woodpaneling from pickle barrels. Many of the materials were sourced locally and there were no VOC finishes or materials used at all.
When the building was finished back in 2000, it was a shining example of what green building could be — and even today the center is still leading the way in green building strategies and performance . Employees are well accustomed to the composting toilets, the automatic ventilation controls, and their creative office layout. One of the reasons the center is so highly esteemed is due to its dedication after construction to building commissioning to ensure all the systems were operating up to their designed specs — in the ensuing year, the organization worked with NREL to monitor the buildings’ performance. The center continues to compare its performance against its operating benchmark to this day.

 

More Shipping Containers!!!!!!

Breathtaking Shipping Container Studio in San Antonio

We’re green with envy over this beautiful shipping container studio in San Antonio designed by Texas architect Jim Poteet. Painted a deep blue, the 40′ shipping container was transformed into a gorgeous backyard retreat, complete with a living green roof, composting toilet, rainwater collection and eco friendly finishes. The studio retreat also features floor-to-ceiling windows cut out of the container, blown-in insulation, and bamboo floors and walls. Dwell has the full scoop on the container as well as a ton of gorgeous pictures.

Fun PreFab Gym Built from Containers in Just Three Days!

by Andrew Michler

The students of the Dunraven School located in South London are enjoying a huge new prefab gym that took only three days to erect! Designed by architecture firm Scabal as the world’s first gym of its kind, the team of designers carefully chose materials that would provide for a fun and bright environment for the school children to enjoy. And best of all, the school reduced overall costs by a third opting to go prefab over a traditional facility built-on-site. But don’t think being budget conscious came at a cost to the overall program — this dynamic eco-friendly design easily provides for twice the engagement.

The bright building uses a wall of containers to hold changing rooms, storage and offices, while at the core of the box arrangement is a spacious gym floor for the kids to get some serious physical education done. While a stacked arrangement of containers could give way to a behemoth of a building, by using four primary colors, lots of light, and fun details like zigzag cutouts for observation deck, Sacbel easily broke the mass down to a more manageable level that also inspires fun.

The 8,200 square meter building uses a number of green materials, including reused shipping containers and walls of translucent polycarbonate (what is used in green houses) to allow light to pour into the space. The school has a tradition of green building, and the gym is no different, even employing a  rainwater collection system for the campus-wide reclaimed water system.

Recycled Dumpster Pools Unveiled in NYC this Weekend!

by Ariel Schwartz

Would you ever go dumpster diving? A whole lot of New York City residents did this weekend, as the city unveiled three unused dumpsters converted into small swimming pools as part of the third annual Summer Streets festival! The dumpster pools were laid out on Park Avenue this weekend for approximately 450 eager swimmers to enjoy.

 

Designed by Macro-Sea, each 50,000-pound pool features a layer of felt below 4,600 pounds of chlorinated water. The 8-by-22 pools are slightly on the small side — they only fit 10 people at a time and aren’t deep enough for diving — but they’re good for soaking.
We’d love to see more of these pop-up pools in places that don’t have the space or cash for full-sized versions. Because sometimes it’s just so hot that you’ll swim anywhere — even in a dumpster.

 

 

Transparent Solar Spray Transforms Windows Into Watts

by Cameron Scott

Photo by Robert S. Donovan
Norwegian Company EnSol AS has developed a remarkable new spray-on solar film that allows windows to generate solar power without clouding the view. The material consists of metal nanoparticles embedded in a transparent composite matrix that can be easily sprayed on. And the cells don’t just work on glass — they can be used on the rest of the house, too!

 Electron microscope image of EnSol nanocrystals

Inhabitat has brought you a number of technologies that make it possible to create ultra-thin solar cells, making them far more versatile. But there’s something particularly satisfying about EnSol AS’ new transparent spray-on solar film.
Lead researcher Christopher Binns of the University of Leicester said, “The coating would be built into the windows or other materials as part of the manufacturing process. It could even be used on the roofs of cars to charge up batteries — although powering the vehicles themselves would probably be pushing it.”
Perhaps EnSol’s slogan should be Solar: It’s not just for rooftops anymore. The cells achieve efficiencies of 20 percent (which is average) and the company claims they will be commercially available at a reasonable price by 2016.

Light-Bending Polymer Sticker Boosts Solar Panel Output by 10%

by Jasmin Malik Chua

Looking for an instant power boost for your solar panels? Slap on a large, transparent sticker by Genie Lens Technologies to get 10 percent more juice. The polymer film, which can be applied to panels you already have installed, comes riddled with microstructures that bend incoming sunlight for better absorption. More light equals more electricity, which in turn lowers the per-watt cost of solar power.


The inexpensive film works by preventing light from bouncing off the surface of the panel, according to Seth Weiss, the company’s CEO and co-founder. Not only does the sticker trap light inside the semiconductor materials that convert light into electricity, but it also diverts incoming rays so that they travel across — rather than through— the panel, bettering their chances of being absorbed.
Tests at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory showed that the film increases power output by between 4 to 12.5 percent, with the biggest improvement occurring when the sky is overcast and incoming light is diffuse. Although adding the sticker, whether in the factory or on solar panels already installed, raises the overall cost of the panels by 1 to 10 percent, the additional electricity generated makes up for the price.
A more efficient solar panel also means getting by with fewer solar panels, according to Travis Bradford, a solar industry analyst and president of the Prometheus Institute. As a result, other costs such as shipping and installation could also drop. Just one downside: Although the film has been rated for 20 years, it hasn’t been tested for durability — scratches, discoloring, and trapped dust can actually lower power output over time.

 

 

 

New Lessons From Old Buildings

Over the last 60 years, architects and engineers forgot how to make buildings work without cheap energy. But many are learning the lessons from the past and applying them to the new.

By Lloyd Alter

 Porches are cool and friendly.
National Archives

A hundred years ago, almost every house had a front porch; they served an important function in the world before air conditioning, when it provided a cooler place to sit. In the early 1980s, Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk put front porches on the houses in Seaside, the iconic planned community that was the first big demonstration of New Urbanism (and where they filmed the Truman Show) They did it to reduce the need for air conditioning, but found other benefits as well, telling NPR:
"People would sit on the front porch instead of in the backyard because they could see people coming and going, say hello to their neighbors and have short conversations," says Plater-Zyberk. "The bonds of community were being formed through that brief interaction."

Credit: Steve Mouzon
Now front porches are almost common again, as New Urbanism spreads and people realize that they are nice, comfortable spaces. But that is only the most obvious of the lessons of the past that architects are learning, and applying to new buildings.

A hundred years ago, awnings were everywhere. It made sense; air conditioning did not exist, and awnings kept the heat from getting in. Now, we let the heat in and pay to use electricity to pump it out again. Dumb and expensive.

H&H Enterprises
But more and more, architects are installing louvres and sunscreens to take advantage of the way the sun is higher in the summer than in the winter. Have a look at this picture; the windows are almost completely in shade by the carefully designed and sized louvres. They make a dull facade look more interesting, too.
More on Awnings: Keep Cool with Awnings

A hundred years ago, buildings were shaped like letters of the alphabet. Es, Os, Us and Ls. Nobody could be too far from a window; that is where the natural light and air was. Then the fans and ducts and air conditioners came in and windows became almost irrelevant. Floor plates became huge and fresh air inside just a memory.

Weber Thompson Architects
But architects are learning , once again, that buildings with fresh air and natural light are not only cheaper to operate but more pleasant to work in. Weber Thompson's Terry Thomas Building in Seattle is an O building, with a big hole in the middle for air and light.
More on the Terry Thomas: Terry Thomas Building By Weber Thompson
Architects: Go Back To The ABCs and Design Buildings Like Letters Again

A hundred years ago if you had electricity it was expensive. People had all kinds of tricks to bring natural light deep into stores, my favourite being prism glass. When electric lighting came in, nobody needed it any more.

Parans
But as electricity becomes more expensive and people try to reduce their carbon footprint, and in Europe where building codes insist that workers have the benefit of natural light, all kinds of systems are being developed to bounce, pipe and reflect natural light deep into buildings. The Parans system shown here is based on fiber optics, but others are as simple as a skylight.
More: Daylighting Is Making a Comeback
Tubular Skylights for Ad Hoc Daylighting Are Totally Cool
DayRay: Flexible Daylighting

A hundred years ago, many buildings were covered in vines. They served a useful function; they can cut the heat gain on a wall by 50%, reduce temperatures and provide insect and bird habitats. They were really high tech, falling off as winter approached to let more warming sun in.

Today architects are once again integrating nature into their buildings. Edouard Francois clads his buildings in green facades, where plants grow to enclose and protect the buildings from the sun. They are also more lively; he says 'Watch a tree. It has a thousand branches, it moves, grows, changes colour!' and thinks buildings should too.
Those are just some of the ideas from old buildings that are being used in new ones.

10 Overlooked Low-Tech Ways of Keeping Your Home Cool

by Lloyd Alter

Ontario Archives
Summer is here and the air is full of the the sound of whining air conditioners, all seriously sucking kilowatts. Yet much of that air conditioning load could be reduced or the air conditioning season shortened if we did simple things, many of them common before air conditioning was common in North America. Here are some low-tech tips for keeping cool.
The best ideas are those that keep the heat out of your home in the first place, rather than paying to pump it out after it gets in.

1. Use awnings.

According to the Washington Post, The Department of Energy estimates that awnings can reduce solar heat gain—the amount temperature rises because of sunshine—by as much as 65 percent on windows with southern exposures and 77 percent on those with western exposures. Your furniture will last longer, too.
We noted in Planet Green last spring that this can translate into a saving of cooling energy of 26 percent in hot climates, and 33 percent in more temperate climates where it might even make air conditioning unneccessary.

Lloyd Alter

2. Plant A Tree.

I don't own an air conditioner. The house immediately to the south does it for us, completely shading the south side of our house. What it misses, a huge ancient maple in its front yard gets, so in winter I get a lot of sun in my window, and in summer I am always in shade. A tree is as sophisticated as any electronic device around; it lets the sun through in winter and grows leaves in summer to block it.
Geoffrey Donovan studied it in Sacramento, and calculated the savings.
"Everyone knows that shade trees cool a house. No one is going to get a Nobel Prize for that conclusion," says the study co-author, Geoffrey Donovan. "But this study gets at the details: Where should a tree be placed to get the most benefits? And how exactly do shade trees impact our carbon footprint?"

Travelpod

3. Plant Vines.

Frank Lloyd Wright once said "a doctor can bury his mistakes, but an architect can only advise his clients to plant vines." It turns out he could have been a mechanical engineer, for it is surprising how effective vines are at keeping a house cool. With the new weatherization grants, the salesmen are out peddling ground source heat pumps to keep you cool for less, but really, free is better.
Vines such as ivy, russian-vine and virgina creeper grow quickly and have an immediate effect; according to Livingroofs.org.
Climbers can dramatically reduce the maximum temperatures of a building by shading walls from the sun, the daily temperature fluctuation being reduced by as much as 50%.Together with the insulation effect, temperature fluctuations at the wall surface can be reduced from between –10°/14°F to 60°C/140°F to between 5°C/41°F and 30°/86°F. Vines also cool your home through envirotranspiration, described in our post Be Cool and Plant A Tree.

4. Tune your Windows

The windows on your home are not just holes in the wall that you open or close, they are actually part of a sophisticated ventilation machine. It is another "Oldway"—People used to take it for granted that you tune them for the best ventilation, but in this thermostat age we seem to have forgotten how.
For instance, everyone knows that heat rises, so if you have high windows and open them when it hot inside, the hot air will vent out. But it can be a lot more sophisticated than that. When air passes over your home, it works the same way as it does over an airplane wing: the Bernoulli effect causes the air on top and on the downwind side of the house to be at a lower pressure than on the upwind side. So if you have double hung windows, you can open the bottom section of the upwind side of the house and the upper section of the downwind side, and the low pressure will suck the air through your house. Make the outlet openings larger than the inlet opening, it increases the draft. That is why I love double hung windows; they offer the most flexibility and options. Others say that casement windows are best because they can open up to 100%; double hungs can never be open more than 50%. However I have seen studies (which I cannot find) that show that double hung windows actually work better because of the many options in setting them.

5. Get a Ceiling Fan

It doesn't have to be like Collin's Batman fan; they come in all kinds of designs and work on the same principle, that moving air evaporates moisture from your skin and keeps you cooler.
Collin notes that using them is one of our 25 Ways to Save the Planet, and they can save you some cash since they operate at a fraction of central and window air-conditioning units (and they can work great in tandem with your A/C if global warming has you sweating it out). As Energy Star reminds us, ceiling fans help keep you cool, rather than cooling the entire room.

Cool Roof Contractor

6. Paint Your Roof

Kristen writes: In much the same way that more ice/snow reflects UV rays instead of absorbing the heat the way the oceans do (think: feedback loop that results from melting polar ice caps), cities are now giving white roofs a second look as a way to cool cities and fight climate change. The Los Angeles Times reports that the Climate Change Research Conference, held this week, advised that if buildings and road surfaces in 100 of the largest cities in the US were covered with lighter and heat-reflective surfaces the savings could be massive.

White Pine Handbook

7. Install Operable Shutters or External Blinds

The best way to deal with unwanted solar gain is to keep it out in the first place. One can do that with properly designed overhangs or bris soleil, which keep out the sun in summer but are designed to let it in during winter. However this is not very flexible. Another option is the exterior blind, quite common in Europe or Australia but expensive and hard to find in North America, where upfront cost always loses out to operating cost.
Shutters really are the most amazing overlooked technology. They provide ventilation, security, shading and storm protection in one simple device.

8. Get an Attic Fan

A lot of people run expensive air conditioning when it is actually pretty cool out- after the sun has been baking a California house all day it can be cool in the evening but the house is still holding a couple of hundred thousand BTUs of heat. In more temperate parts of the country, just moving the air and having good ventilation could eliminate the need for AC much of the time.

Culinary Historians of Ontario

9. Don't Cook Hot Food Inside

There is a reason our ancestors built summer kitchens; those stoves put out a lot of heat and you didn't want them in your house in summer. Outside summer kitchens are all the rage in the luxury house/ mcmansion set as well. It really makes no sense to run a stove inside, just to then spend money to run air conditioning to remove the heat again. So get a gas barbecue and grill your vegetables, take advantage of farmers markets to get fresh stuff, and eat lots of salad.

10. Be Smart Where You Put Your Money and Energy.

John's graph from the Florida Solar Energy Center says it all. When the weatherization contractors come to get you to insulate your house, (the most expensive thing you can do to save energy) you can show them that this makes no sense, only 7% of the cooling load is coming through the walls. A couple of hours with a caulking gun to reduce infiltration would do more.
When they tell you that you need to install expensive new low-e tinted windows, remember that an awning or a shutter is more sophisticated and flexible; you have the choice whether to let the sun in or not.
Tape up your ducts, turn off your computers and save your money. The simple, low-tech tried and true methods cost less, save more energy and work forever.

Awesome Hidden Lair Tucked Under Mounds of Green Grass

by Yuka Yoneda

We're really into buried homes here at Inhabitat - from this crazy flower-shaped one in Britain to these 700 year old hobbit houses in Iran, we've scoured the globe looking for the coolest ones. So you can imagine how we felt when we stumbled upon this delightful hidden gem by Vetsch Architektur. Made of concrete and earth, the Swiss estate is actually a cluster of grass-blanketed houses encircling a pretty little lake. Aside from using natural and recycled materials and having a green roof, the structure was built using typical earth house construction, resulting in an insulating blanket that protects it from rain, low temperatures, wind and natural abrasion.

 

The estate is actually quite spacious and consists of nine houses – three 3 bedroom, a 4 bedroom, a 5 bedroom, three 6 bedroom and one 7 bedroom – clustered around a lake. In order to maximize daylighting, the areas which would be used most during the day are situated towards the south, and the nighttime areas towards the north. Bathrooms and stairs to the basement sit between the two and all of the bathrooms get natural light via skylights.
While the basement and parking lot (yes there is a subterranean parking lot) were built using conventional methods, the entire ground floor was constructed using the typical earth home sprayed concrete technique. The house also makes use of recycled glass and is topped with a protective green roof which can be used to grow grass or even edible plants.

 

Small Space Living: Tiny House Trend Grows Bigger

by Lea Bogdan

An increasing number of Americans are expressing interest in smaller space living, with some even owning homes under 100sq ft! One indicator of the trend is that instead of saying that tiny house owners are “downsizing”, those writing and speaking about little homes have coined the euphemism “rightsizing,” which more aptly describes how many view their choice to go small. Rising costs of energy, the recent mortgage crisis, and the troubled economy have all contributed to the tiny house trend, but the tiny house owners don’t describe a sense of loss with the space change. Instead, they feel they have traded in square footage for an increase in the richness of their life. Dee Williams, who has gained national attention for her 84sq ft Tumbleweed home, says that that her small house made her realize that “the more intentional you are in your choices, the more every change makes room for more changes.”

The National Association of Home Builders reports that the average size of newly constructed homes was 2438 sq ft in 2009, but sizes have been decreasing since 2007, where they peaked at over 2500sq ft. The NAHB chief economist, David Crowe, believes that the “decline is related to phenomena such as an increased share of first-time home buyers, a desire to keep energy costs down, smaller amounts of equity in existing homes to roll into the next home, tighter credit standards and less focus on the investment component of buying a home.” Census studies show that new houses are being constructed with fewer bedrooms, and the percentage of homes with three or more bathrooms has also dropped.
Many would argue that the recent trend has been heavily influenced by American architectural history. Specifically pointing to times when there was a need for affordable, quickly constructed homes, Levittown homes, built in the 1950’s, were an extremely successful small house style built for returning veterans of World War II that could be bought with a down payment as little as $100. Other historians point further back to the efficient design of row homes, like those in Philadelphia and Boston.

Prefabricated homes are another style of small, affordable housing. They are often built in large sections before being assembled on site, and they have been widely covered on Inhabitat. North American retailers are noticing the need for prefabs, and they have introduced a wide range of reasonably priced, well-designed models. The Katrina Cottages that were designed in the aftermath of the hurricane disaster are now available from Lowes. Another US-based retailer, Design Within Reach, was until recently selling their ultra-stylish kitHAUS. Shipping container prefabs are also available in the US from companies like Phoenix-based Upcycle Living. Builders have answered the call too, offering modules or cottages like the Eco-Cottages from Nationwide.
There are many web-based resources available for those interested in tiny houses, including a list generated by the Small House Society of design firms that specialize in small spaces. The Tiny House blog will show you examples from around the world, and if you want to build your own, Tumbleweed House Company and PAD(Portland Alternative Dwellings) have plans and workshops to show you how.
You may be interested, but not sure that the tight quarters would work with your lifestyle. To get a feel for life in a tiny home, google and check out the video of Dee Williams in her 84 sq ft home in Washington. Living off the grid in a home you built yourself sounds like it could be really cozy and liberating at the same time!

 

Shipping Container Pavilion Springs up in San Francisco Presidio

by Moe Beitiks

Here on Inhabitat we’ve brought you shipping containers arranged as homes, schools, observatories, and stacks of glory. While you may say you’ve seen every arrangement there is to be had, we say you need to check out this container trifecta by Ogrydziak/Prillinger Architects! Besides boasting the usual specs incorporating recycled materials, this award-winning angular building comes complete with a collection of art-homes made just for the local flora and fauna. An incredible forward-thinking exhibition pavilion built for Presidio Habitats in San Francisco, this design has just received a 2010 Design Award from the American Institute of Architects, California Council (AIACC). Read ahead to learn more about this site-specific project and the local wildlife it supports.

The Presidio is an army-base turned national park located within the San Francisco city limits. The park hosts a thriving, and in some cases, endangered collection of native flora and fauna. The For-Site Foundation invited a series of artists into the park to create installations that would be able to host its native neighbors. Design challenges included creating a race challenge for the elusive Black-tailed Jackrabbit, a series of ceramic nests for the Western Screech Owl, and a few bright yellow perches for humans from which they could view the Great Blue Heron. But these were only some of the proposed projects for Presidio Habitats, and the overall exhibition pavilion displays a number of other ideas from well known eco-designers such as Amy Franceschini to Michelle Kaufmann.
The site itself is aligned along the northern San Francisco coast framing a view of the Golden Gate Bridge and catching the maximum amount of natural light. The deck, flooring and outdoor seating have been made from surplus Presidio Cypress, harvested onsite through a reforestation program. The entire structure was built off-site and put into place with a crane to reduce impact . Visitors can watch exhibition videos and learn a little bit more about their native neighbors until 2011, when the exhibition closes.

 

Shipping Containers

Deceiving Shipping Container Home That Doesn’t Look Like One

by Bridgette Meinhold

 

 

If we hadn't told you this was a shipping container house, would you have known?? With a contemporary classic style, regular-looking facade and huge light-filled windows, this lovely home in Richmond, California, designed by Leger Wanaselja Architects, is a great example of the beautiful work that can done with shipping containers. You may like the industrial look of the container, but if you're into a more traditional look, this is the house for you! Check out the interior shots of this deceiving home - they give you a really good idea of the available space.

 

Built out of three insulated shipping containers and stacked on two levels with a two-story atrium in the middle, this home packs a lot into a small footprint. Coming in at only 1,350 sq feet, the home has three good sized bedrooms, and a large open living room which connects into the long kitchen and dining room. Two 40′ containers are stacked on top of each other serving as the master bedroom on top and a kitchen/dining area on the ground floor. The other container is cut in half and stacked to create two more bedrooms. Between the stacks is a large two story living area with floor to ceiling windows and a staircase and bridge to connect to the rooms upstairs.
Solar passively designed, deep roof eaves were used to protect from summer solar gain and operable windows were used to maximize ventilation. As the containers are already insulated, they act as weatherproof exterior siding, insulation, and structural frame. Insulation was only needed in the roof and flooring and framing was only done on interior walls and for the windows. Additional green features include the use of low VOC paints, a 100% wool carpet, bamboo flooring, a 50% flyash concrete foundation, blown-in cellulose insulation, stacked plumbing, roof rainwater collection, high efficiency lighting, solatubes, and a ton more green features.

Shipping Containers Used for Employee Housing In Dubai Desert

by Bridgette Meinhold

In the world of green architecture and affordable housing, shipping container homes are often considered to be practical, cost-effective and even environmentally-friendly. In Dubai, however, the prospect seems a bit dubious. Gulf News reported today on a contracting firm in Dubai that has built housing for workers out of shipping containers, which can become unbearably hot in desert environments if they aren’t properly insulated. On the other hand, the containers probably didn’t cost that much, can be easily relocated to the next job, they can withstand sand storms, and the contracting firm says that the containers have sufficient insulation against the scorching desert sun.

Dubai-based construction firm Alsahel Contracting Company LLC (ACC) noticed its employees had to drive long distances to and from the job site each day and were coming to work tired. To combat this, they built employee housing from 40′ shipping containers that house 8 people each, with two separate rooms on either side outfitted with bunk beds. The containers are also equipped with an air conditioner per side, exhaust fans, and “decoration wood”, which is meant to help insulate the container. In the hot desert, the metal containers are likely to soak up a lot of heat, although they are better suited to withstand sand storms than wood cabins, which are more likely to degrade.
The Gulf News article seems to insinuate that the workers are being mistreated by being housed in shipping containers, although it is never blatantly said. Granted, these containers are certainly not luxury condos — but they do seem to provide adequate housing for a temporary workforce. The construction firm says that the containers are safe and have governmental approval and they have tried to make them look respectable. What do you think — does the Gulf News article raise a red flag or is this a cool use of shipping containers?

Solar Powered Shipping Container is a Pop-Up Prefab Party

by Andrew Michler

Planning a party? You might want to check out Boxman Studio’s solar-powered party venue, which comes conveniently packed into a pop-up shipping container. The innovative system that takes just 20 minutes to set up but creates a classy place to enjoy a party. Unlike tents, the container is quick, lower impact, and much more durable, plus it’s about the hippest way to green your summer shindigs.

 

Check out these party digs- seating for 26 folks, a full bar, solar powered plug-ins for a TV, fridge, karaoke, lava lamps, whatever. The container walls fold down to create a covered 500 square-foot bamboo floor. Place several panels next to each other and you have a huge dance floor. They are happy to customize individual units for different needs.
Boxman Studio dutifully notes that energy to recycle the steel container is 4000 kWhrs, while the conversion of a container is 200 kWhrs. That is a powerful example on how sustainable reuse can be. Tents are notorious for getting shredded in a season or two, and they can be tough to set up on hard surfaces – the Boxman Studio’s sturdy containers can keep the party going.