You could be forgiven for thinking that a home that draws its inspiration from a dumpster would be ugly. But the new housing project Kasita offers tiny yet beautiful city apartments that show how the constraints of living in a dumpster can yield valuable knowledge for home design.
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Kasita consists of a stack of space-efficient mobile homes that have been optimised for today’s increasingly expensive and overcrowded urban environment.
Inspired by The Dumpster Project, this is the brainchild of environmental science professor Jeff Wilson, of Huston-Tillotson University, and design firm Frog.
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Wilson designed the new apartments in conjunction with a team of industrial designers instead of architects in order to avoid “expected solutions,” according to 6sqft. And he certainly did just that — the concept has been brilliantly and beautifully executed, with every cubic inch of space being utilised to the fullest extent.
According to Digital Trends, the unique new development will see its first location in downtown Austin, Texas, and will be ready to take occupants in the spring of 2016, while other U.S. cities and even Stockholm will get their own Kasitas sometime in the near future. Owners and tenants will then be able to move their city of residence to wherever another Kasita development is located, literally moving their entire home and contents with them.
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The 208-square-foot units are projected to cost $600 per month, which is about half the market rate for apartments of a similar type in downtown Austin.
They will take electricity from the grid initially and then from solar power at a later stage. The units will have all the creature comforts you would expect in a modern home, including a washing machine, dryer and kitchen, and cool features such as dimmable privacy glass, smart home capabilities and energy-efficient lighting. The mobile apartments are also tiled with special tiles that allow occupants to fully customise their walls and really make the space feel like their own.
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