In 2050... modular thinking will be the norm for homes/ communities.

Description: the aim is to imagine what modular solar punk capsule-homes could be. A capsule home may be a series of pieced together rooms (i.e. that can be added to, changed, swapped as a person's needs change) or a single structure that is itself a home (i.e. designing for people who live in the smallest space such as in miniature apartments in HK or people are homeless). Each room itself may also be modular and manipulable (i.e. with fold-out walls, furniture, staircases).

3 definitions for "capsule home":

1. Puzzle piece like rooms that changes with needs
2. One small space that is a capsule home
3. Think about the the manipulability of each room

One of the major challenges with home building is that interfaces for electrical, HVAC, and plumbing have to be set from the beginning and are usually unchangeable. In order to move towards modular houses, the interfaces between modular units is extremely important to design.

Interface ideas:

• Cubes/ rectangles as rooms

  • Magnetic (poga pins - electrical connectors that can be depressed, apply pressure)

    

  • Lego

  • Lego w/ lid.

    

  • Sliding

    • Slides half way (rooftop gardens)

      

  • Laser cut jigsaw (i.e. boxes.py)

    

  • Velcro mechanical design

• Requirements: power, plumbing, HVAC

• Plumbing/HVAC

  • Interior, inside of the walls, exterior, could be wall

  • Plumbing could be the wall (water is one of the best insulators and heaters) (sheets of metal with water inside, maybe thin and volume of water through surface area)

    

  • Soft or stiff HVAC (imprecise interface)

• Power

  • Metal velcro to connect electricity

    

  • Wireless electricity - coils through the floor and ceiling

    • Could charge your devices through the ground

    • Allows for imprecision of fit as well (as any amount of surfacing touching another surface creates a valid connection)

      

• Other shapes

  • Hexagon or any equilateral triangle- honey comb (vertical or flat)

    • Transition through edges

    • Transition through grid that overlays

    • Use the equilateral triangles as built-ins or storage

      

  • Spheres (optimal surface area to volume ratio)

    • Spheres and spheres share 1 point of contact

    • Spheres and sockets share an infinite point of contact

    • Room 3-axis gimbal inside of a sphere, roll the spheres around to be in contact with others

      

  • Cone (i.e. lipid bilayer, tipis, hobbit house)

• How do you make a room larger?

  • Kind of like origami, with missing sides and sliding sides, you can create bigger rooms

    

  • Removable walls

• How to deal with windows

  • Why do we have windows the size we do? No windows we feel unnaturally discounted, too many windows we feel too exposed

    

  • And are solar panels

  • Smart glass where every panel can be transparent/ opaque

    • Breakfast really big window
    • Afternoon office maybe too bright so less window
    • Perhaps in the future, they can change colour as well, allowing software to control the art/ wall colour at will

We're convinced rethinking interfaces for the very difficult parts of home building (i.e. HVAC, plumbing, electricity, foundation) will be key to unlocking modular homes that change with the needs of its occupants