Designed for empty warehouses or buildings under construction, these material-light shelters provide functionality for liminal interiors either past their prime not yet in use. Places like the infamous Tower of David, a restarted project previously inhabited by skyscraper squatters, would be an ideal candidate for this sort of system.

A polyethylene-coated metal grid frames these modest shelters, serving as walls and doors and supporting interior shelves and an exterior fabric facade. A plastic-laminated plywood floor floats above concrete or whatever raw surface is found in a target structure. Nylon nets provide a degree of privacy while letting in light and can be covered by opaque cloth as well.

Each dwelling can be completed with just $1200 and while no heating or cooling is included the system is intended to work well in tropical or other climates supporting open-air living. Since a stable roof and floor are provided, the main task is simply filling in gaps for habitation.

All(zone) drew inspiration for their Light House from traditional architecture of Thailand, often designed to be collapsed and moved as needed.

The light and flat-packable materials make it easy to ship these systems in conventional containers or other forms of transit, making them suitable possibilities for emergency shelters as well.

The designers tested their prototype by deploying it in a parking garage and staying within their mockup module for a few nights.

On the Caracas skyline, the Tower of David stands tall and proud. It was once a sign of Venezula’s position in the economic marketplace. Today, the 45-story skyscraper has earned a very different type of notoriety: it is quite possibly the tallest squatter-occupied building in the world. The government calls its residents “invaders” – but they think of themselves as resourceful citizens who make the best of a terrible situation.

(image via: NY Times)

In the early 1990s, businessman David Brillembourg financed the building that was to become a center of commerce for Caracas and all of Venezuela. But Brillembourg’s death in 1993 caused the building – along with many of Brillembourg’s other business assets – to fall into the hands of the government. Economic downturn and a dramatic housing shortage changed the social, political and even physical landscapes of Caracas.

(image via: NY Times)

By 2007, the housing crisis had reached such heights that many parts of Caracas had been taken over by squatters. People who were unable to find traditional housing simply moved into empty buildings, including the unfinished skyscraper and more than 20 other abandoned structures in the area. The government is well aware of the “invasions,” but does nothing to either evict the squatters or provide them with help to find traditional housing.

(image via: NY Times)

The Tower of David serves as an impromptu home for some 2,500 displaced Venezuelans – some made homeless by the economy and others by flooding and other natural disasters. They occupy the corridors and the chambers once meant for banking offices. In the absence of a working elevator, they walk up to reach all 28 of the currently-occupied levels. Families and individuals alike find shelter in this highly unusual home.

(image via: NY Times)

Unlike the typical image of squatter settlements – disorganized every-man-for-himself sort of environs – this group has decided to stick together and help one another. They have security details at the entrances with constant walkie-talkie communication. There is electricity on every occupied floor after residents tapped into the local grid. Running water is rigged up as high as the 28th floor, and small resident-run shops are scattered throughout the building.

(image via: NY Times)

There is a strange kind of contradiction here in the Tower. The missing windows, terraces without guardrails and unfinished walls present some of the most dangerous conditions one can imagine raising a family in. However, living in even a dangerous building is safer and more secure than living on the streets. The building which was meant to be a symbol of wealth and success has become precisely the opposite. The opulent office spaces with their breathtaking views, originally meant for bankers and businessmen, now belong to the squatters of Caracas, those desperate and forgotten souls who make a home wherever they can.

The term “off the grid” has been proudly used for many years by those who choose to produce their own electricity or live without electricity. But there’s a whole other perspective to living off the grid: those who do it out of necessity. The majority of these can be defined as squatters: people living in an otherwise unoccupied place without a legal right to be there. An estimated one billion people are defined as squatters – that’s about one out of every seven people on the planet. Squatting has been depicted in movies and television shows as a practice of the poor, the drug-addled and the otherwise disaffected, but there are layers upon layers in this segment of the population, and some of them are full of surprises.

Squatting as a Political Protest

(images via: Daily Mail)

With millions of families waiting for public housing in Britain, it seems a shame to see so many residences sitting empty. At least that’s what a group of artists calling themselves the Da! Collective said when they moved into this 30-room, £6.25 million Mayfair mansion in October 2008. The home, originally built in the 1730s and now owned by the billionaire Duke of Westminster, has been abandoned for quite some time, and the interior is in a state of disrepair. The group of squatters, mostly young middle-class people, decided to move into the home to give it new life. They gained access through an open front window and set up residence inside, decorating the 30-some rooms with art projects and sacking out in sleeping bags. They also changed the locks and had the electric service reconnected. In Britain, squatting is not a criminal matter and the building’s owner has to file an eviction notice to remove any unauthorized occupants. The collective was ordered to leave the Mayfair mansion just two months after taking up residence, but that hasn’t stopped them from staking out new abandoned homes to squat in.

Squatting as Art

(images via: Dornob)

As with the London squatters, these brothers are occupying an otherwise unused space not out of necessity, but to make a statement. Tiago and Gabrial Primo climbed 33 feet up the side of a Rio de Janeiro building (with safety harnesses firmly in place) and spent 12 hours a day for several months hanging out in their hammock, lounging in their loveseat or snoozing in their bed. And to answer the first question just about everyone asks: their bathroom was located indoors, in the adjoining art gallery.

Subterranean Lives: Mole People

(images via: Dornob)

It’s long been thought that whole societies of people dwell beneath large cities, living out their lives in a world completely hidden from the one most of us occupy. In her 1993 book The Mole People, Jennifer Toth exposed and explored the vast society of people living under the surface of New York City. Making their homes in abandoned subway tunnels and using discarded materials to build makeshift shelters, these “mole people” remain largely invisible to surface dwellers. They are so invisible, in fact, that many people doubt Toth’s accounts of their underground lives. But a 2009 article in London’s The Sun exposed a similar conclave living in the storm drains beneath Las Vegas. Complete with interviews and photographs, this story seemed to confirm what many had previously called an urban legend.

A City of Garbage Collectors

(images via: Dornob)

On the outskirts of Cairo sits a city that defies logic. It looks like a scene straight out of the movie Wall-E: every available surface is covered in garbage. There are piles of it in every building, on the streets, even on the rooftops. In between the mountains of rubbish, herds of pigs nosh happily on whatever organic matter there is to be found in the refuse . Yet this isn’t an abandoned place left to be taken over by wildlife: it’s a city of 30,000 inhabitants. Manshiyat naser, usually known as Garbage City, is filled with people who make their living collecting and sorting trash. They put aside anything that can be recycled for money or sold and feed the organic refuse to the pigs (or at least they did until the swine flu of 2009 forced Egyptian officials to remove the pigs). The area functions much like any other city, having shops, schools and churches, but lacks a stable infrastructure to provide amenities like electricity, running water and sewer service. The people who live there aren’t paid to haul the garbage away from apartment buildings, but they are sometimes tipped for their services and manage to support themselves by sorting Cairo’s trash.

Life in a Cage: The Crowded City

(images via: Pop-Up City and Schoeni)

An unfortunate side effect of urbanization is the skyrocketing costs of city life. In Hong Kong, property prices have reached world record highs. In response to the unaffordable prices of even small apartment, people have been living in wire cages like these for years. The enclosures are tiny, and it can get unbearably hot with all those bodies in a small space. In a CNN story from October 2009, residents revealed that there were 19 people living in a 625 square foot apartment. A bottom-level cage will run you around $150 a month, whereas an upper-level enclosure would cost closer to $100 because they are slightly smaller. While these residents aren’t exactly squatters – they pay exorbitant rents for the amount of space they live in – they certainly are off-grid. There are two toilets for all 19 residents, one faucet, no shower, and their electricity is “donated.” Many residents end up living in cages because of the failing Hong Kong economy and the poor job market.

Freeganism is a truly fascinating way of approaching life, that involves reusing leftover food (dumpster diving), living in unused spaces (squatting) and avoiding jobs or owning vehicles whenever possible. Like Burning Man participants or others who create and visit Temporary Autonomous Zones, Freegans try to operate outside of normal societal boundaries.