If the idea of escape seems all the more enticing now that the rest of the world is caught in the back-to-school rush, here’s another amazing prefab remedy for your wanderlust. Escape to the beach, the mountains or the trees in San Francisco-based Kyu Che‘s sustainable Lifepod. Loosely based on the traditional Mongolian ger (or ‘yurt’ as the Russian translation goes), the Lifepod is at once organic and high-tech. Built to be highly portable, the Lifepod is a fully functioning, off-the-grid mini capsule for modern nomadic living.
Originally conceived in 1997, Lifepods are constructed using the most advanced 21st century automotive, aeronautic, nautical and RV technologies. Inspired by roaming mammals, the futuristic prefabs are designed as ‘quadrupedal fuselages’ with footings that can adjust to the contours of their environs, rather than disfiguring the landscape to fit to the house. All the modular pieces fit into a 40 ft container and can be shipped anywhere around the world. Using state-of-the-art technology, you and your Lifepod can roam the world un-tethered and off-the-grid.
Should your inner nomad be perfectly content with a zen staycation, Kyu Che also offers a Lifepod capsule that can be fitted with minimalist screen or glass doors and used as a sculptural garden retreat, tea house, or sanctuary from the madness of daily life.
+ Lifepod
Via be seen.com
“adjust to the contours of their environs, rather than disfiguring the landscape to fit to the house”
i like that it is pretty much what the natives did before europeans wife them off the grid.
That module is most interresting indeed, i wonder how easy it is to assembles though. Suspending it in the air can’t be easy.
Seriously, when will city slickers stop thinking old growth forest is a spot to hang a big tub of white plaster… come on people ! Let’s get real here… This shit has nothing to do with sustainable living… and for crying out loud, I’m a designer who actually lived in a yurt while travelling in Mongolia, this has zero to do witha yaourt. I mean, can I put this high tech automotive derivative material outerspace new age box on the back of a donkey ?
At best, this is an office space in the backyard and I would probably have to pressure was the hell of it everyday just to keep it clean, especially in the fall…
You people are really starting to forget about the reality.
[...] The home of the future? The lifepod habitat can keep you sheltered in sky, sea and land. [inhabitat] [...]
where’s does the water come from and where does the toilet flush to?
Yes it’s pretty, but tipere hits the nail on the head. Another aspect of its impracticality is the lack of privacy it offers. I understand it’s part of the concept, but how many people have a private island or a patch of old growth forest with no one around for miles to occupy? It’s a fantasy of retreat to an isolated and unspoiled nature, without considering the reality of living in the bush. For example, where will the human waste of the hypothetical residents go, into cyberspace? It all reminds me a bit of SUV advertisements in which those monstrous gas guzzlers are seen tearing up pristine mountains trails, the continued existence of which our gasoline-addicted society is jeopardizing.
I think it is highly impractical, It doesn’t appear to be easily transportable for a “nomadic” lifestyle as such. If wheels were added it would just be an RV wouldn’t it? You need a shipping container to move it?
Also I don’t see any advantage to the minimalist design, in fact I think it is rather ugly. More like a scientific laboratory than something people would want to live in! I thought part of the whole modern design ethos was to have things blend in with their environment not stand out like sore thumbs! Just looks like a gimmick, that few, if any would find useful.
Oh dear- ‘All the modular pieces fit into a 40 ft container and can be shipped anywhere around the world. Using state-of-the-art technology, you and your Lifepod can roam the world un-tethered and off-the-grid.’ Erm, just look at that statement for a few moments, Per-lease!! How on earth is this sustainable or practical for ‘nomads’? This inappropriate nonesense dressed in buzz words makes my soul weep….
Just look at Buckminster Fullers concepts for a Dymaxion House, utilising unusable industrial capacity in the Aircraft industry at the end of the Second World War, and you will see the basis of a better solution. Lifepod a great name for the concept, but lets consider the affordability cost per unit, the delivery cost, the utility “cost” to make it workable. Apart from all that, consider that humans are so prone to want familiar shapes and forms, not so much “style-stuff” that just stretches the imagination. The most logical engineering solutions seem to be missing.
Finally, if it needs a container to move it in, consider that the container has to be deliverable,and then returned or reserved for the next relocation. Why not make the container the
key component, or the alternative, do without the container completely. Suddenly, we have the standard portable building, which is too cumbersome to deliver to disaster zones,by road transport and certainly not by air.
Sorry, but there are simpler more practical and affordable solutions, and even mine are 20 years old or more.