Shelter In A Cart

designboom is a website that invites submissions from international designers for competitions that range from designing folding chairs to imagining the kitchen of the future. Their recent competition was to design a shelter in a cart -- some kind of portable thing that could convert to some kind of shelter thing.

The winning entry is basically a modification of a shopping cart design (making it relatively inexpensive to produce) which includes a fold-out mattress board with a tent enclosure. More than 90 honorable mentions are also featured from the more than 4000 entries received.

The controversy over the idea was interesting... some people accused the group of being superficial and self-satisfying. While it is true that homelessness is a complex issue that must be addressed on many levels, you are thinking about homelessness right now and probably wouldn't be otherwise. And then maybe later today you'll think about what it's like to live with not enough, or about whether you could make do with less. And then maybe the next time you see a shopping cart, you'll think again about people who have no sense of home. And I think that makes it worthwhile.

A group called Global Peace Containers has taken the concept a step further. They use discarded shipping containers to construct sustainable housing and community buildings, mostly for use in impoverished communities. I heard a CBC interview a few months ago with a Canadian guy who is trying to do the same thing as a response to homelessness in our own country.

While these projects may not be the final solution, thinking outside the box is what's needed (no pun intended!). Decades of homelessness and poverty initiatives later, these issues are still issues in our society. Thank goodness for the Make Poverty History campaign, which has not only brought international inequalities to the public consciousness, but also has ending child poverty in Canada as one of its goals. Now there's a project you can get behind right in your own community!