Design, Science and Technology

Zhou Ying and Niu Yuntao created a floating emergency shelter that could save lives during floods and tsunamis.

The alarming pace of rising sea levels has inspired designers Zhou Ying and Niu Yuntao to create a floating emergency shelter that could save lives during floods and tsunamis. Instead of conventional exposed life rafts, survivors can use the Duckweed Survival House as an enclosed floating shelter that protects people from large waves while trying to get to safety.

Via Lauren Moss

Margot Krasojevic's latest proposal, a mesh shelter that takes the concept of snow caves and applies it to an artificial structure, is built for an eminently practical purpose: a built emergency shelter for climbers and others caught in extreme conditions.

The elaborate, high tech and naturally contoured structure is as much a thought experiment as it is a serious architectural proposal, with the carbon fibre mesh acting as a snow-catcher, forming a frame for a large snow drift. The captured snow works as both building material and insulation, allowing for the creation of a shelter of several rooms. Inside sits a wooden frame suspended from the mesh and attached to the landscape by climbing ropes, which avoid freezing by swaying. This frame can have canvases attached to it, and contains cell-like modules that would act as sleeping areas...

Via Lauren Moss