Arup, alongside Carl Turner Architects, The Building Centre and CBMM unveils “A New House for London” at the London Design Festival 2015.
Built to coincide with the festival, the prefabricated structure is constructed out of two specially adapted shipping containers, and offers an interpreted solution to one our generation’s most important design and social challenges; affordable housing.
“A New House for London” is collaborative project that challenges land-use thinking and illustrates how under-utilised brownfield land could be used to locate prefabricated, adaptable spaces, suitable for modern urban living. Prefabricated housing can provide an accessible, affordable and appropriate use of such sites and possibly could prove to be an interim solution to the lack of housing within the capital. The cost of this new home is just 10% of the average London property.
Arup has designed a simpler, more resilient low voltage direct current (DC) energy network for the container home. This network allows for storing energy within the home - improving energy security, affordability and sustainability. Importantly, this also means that the structure can operate independently of the main grid. In the long term, this different approach to energy management within the domestic environment could turn energy consumers into an energy producers and begin to democratise energy generation.
