Design Discovery: QuaDror Unveiled

Architizer News

Design Discovery: QuaDror Unveiled

February 24, 2011

QuaDror Home: emergency housing kit utilizing the newly-discovered space truss from Studio Dror.

Every now and then, amidst our bitching about hyper-pricey luxury housing, design news comes along that really does matter. It’s not every day that a new structural geometry is invented. We’re not made of stone, okay?

Click through for an incredibly exciting innovation from Studio Dror that you’ll probably be seeing a lot of in the coming years.

Design Indaba (“A better world through creativity”) began yesterday in South Africa, and kicking it off was Tel Aviv-born Dutch-educated Dror Benshetrit of Studio Dror, who unveiled a revelatory innovation called QuaDror.

QuaDror is, at the most basic level, a structural system. It’s a space truss geometry that maintains the strength of a solid cube with only 20% of the volume.

The QuaDror form functions at a variety of scales, from the hand-held to the urban. QuaDror Home is perhaps the most amazing: the kit of parts (including instructions, tools and QuaDror “universal joints”) would allow people to construct their own emergency housing using whatever structural material (wood, bamboo, pipes, fencing, etc) they have available. The real bombshell: 1,750 of the kits can be shipped in a single 40-foot container. The past decade has seen so many debacles involving the implementation of distaster-relief housing – QuaDror offers a solution not only to the build-ability issue but also to problems like delivery and sustainability.

The studio notes, “The world’s homeless population increases by approximately 100,000 every day. The Kissick Institute forecasts that 40% of the world’s population will need access to housing by 2030. We are gathering cross-disciplinary experts to introduce the QuaDror Home to these populations in need.”

Just a few of the many applications that Studio Dror has showcased on the QuaDror website: