Migrant Worker Housing of the Future

Migrant Worker Housing of the Future

At housing design competitions you expect to see designs for energy efficient solar houses, underground houses, tree houses, perhaps even collapsable take it with you houses, but not housing for migrant workers designed to serve as a rainwater collector as well as an eight hundred square foot living space. The Canteen Farm House, a rain gathering house for migrant workers was an award winner in the D3 Housing of Tomorrow competition. The idea behind its design is to comfortably shelter migrant workers, while collecting and distributing rain water through an “elastic, expanding exterior skin”. Sounds like something right out of Star Wars doesn’t it? In theory, the elastic outer skin of the Canteen Farm House would swell with water as it filled up, then reroute that water to an existing irrigation infrastructure. Solving two problems at once, comfortable shelter and water shortages. Will we see Canteen Farm House communities spotted across the rural countryside anytime soon? Probably not. While the design is award winning, and definitely innovative, it is also, at least for now, impractical. But dreams have to start somewhere.

Previous ReportThe Time Has Come
Next ReportOrganic Crackdown