DesignXDesign in partnership with Ant Studio invites participation in the
International Design Competition
habitat on the move
Join the Competition+ ‘To live is to travel.’
Humans are nomadic by instinct. In the broader evolution of humankind through time, the notion of settling down to make home and hearth is relatively a recent phenomenon which has created more problems than solved for the species. Humans have survived in spite of many forms of climatic events, natural disasters, disease and epidemics visiting us, making life and living fragile and impermanent, often resulting in total extinction of settlements, forced migrations and need to make fresh beginnings.
+ ‘We have not inherited the earth from our fathers, we are borrowing it from our children.’
To live in harmony with other forms of life on earth and with nature as a whole should have come naturally to us, but that has not been the case. In particular the damage done by the unprecedented pace of change over the last century or so has brought us face to face with the precipice that we find ourselves in the midst of. The world’s urban population already at more than 50% of the total world population is projected to multiply many folds in the very near future. As a species, a nervous one at present, are we ready or equipped to face the challenge of this magnitude or is our response going to be like always; finding yet another solution to a problem created by a previous solution?
+ ‘…. Progress is the realization of utopias.’
We have the freedom to revisit the evolutionary choices made by our forefathers, we have the freedom to question the wisdom of our stationary, sedentary and synthetic lifestyle that we are caught up in. We have the option to fall in line with other forms of life that inhabit the planet earth and restart living in harmony with the immediate and distant natural forces. Reality or Utopia?
+ ‘This is your world. Shape it or someone else will.’
The ongoing Corana Pandemic has brought into sharp focus the fragility of the human condition. In particular it has reminded us of the need to be prepared for adjusting the way we live and organize our habitat, to be ever ready to adapt to myriad challenges brought about by the unpredictable forces of nature or by the self-destructive actions of humans.
+ ‘Creativity is intelligence having fun.’ Here is a challenge for designers of all age groups, nationalities etc. to unleash their unlimited imagination and creative abilities and marry them with cutting-edge evolving scientific/technological advances of the moment in order to project a utopia for Mobitecture: habitat on the move. It could be a device with no wheels, one or two wheels, three wheels, four wheels or more, could be water, ice or air borne. It could be none of these, a combination of any or all of these. Powered by hands, feet, propellers, sun, wind in conjunction with means and mediums mechanical, digital, robotic or AI driven.
+ ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’
Here is your chance to create magic of a peripatetic lifestyle for an imaginary family of four while catering to their basic needs within a maximum area of 10 sq mt
(Refer Submission Guidelines for details)
+ ‘There is no better designer than nature.’
Here is your chance to create a visual ode to life on the move and express gratitude to nature by learning deeply from it. Learn from our co-inhabitants such as turtles/tortoises, crabs, snails, pangolins who are indistinguishable from the shelter that they carry on them and vice versa. How would it be if humans could do the same?
Studio Next
James Law Cybertecture
UNEP
Studio IF
Ant Studio