A small but informative book by author Mary James and titled “Recreating the American Home: The Passive House Approach” is replete with excellent photographs, floor plans and construction details to complement the well-written text. The book does a great job explaining the passive house approach to construction and describes each of the eight featured homes with a perfect balance of project background, builder motivation, economic considerations, technical details and final performance results.

To rapidly create shelter from materials in the local supply chain consider the hexayurt. The simplest hexayurt will last for years in most climates and cost less than $100. Make a wall by putting six sheets of plywood on their sides in a hexagon. Cut six more sheets in half diagonally, and screw them together into a shallow cone. Lift the roof on to the wall with a group of people, then fasten it down with more screws. Seal and paint it for durability. Your basic hexayurt is complete.
The World Cultures and Geography class at the Bonnie Branch Middle School in Ellicott City, Maryland built this hexayurt in response to a class discussion on designing and building low cost emergency shelters  for the earthquake survivors in Haiti. The school is planning to recycle the construction into Hexayurt scale model kits that will be sold as a fundraiser for emergency housing in Haiti.
To see the hexayurt under construction, visit the project website.
Hexayurts are sturdy and space-economical structures meant to temporarily house those in need. In less than two hours, a cardboard Hexayurt can be built and ready to move into. If you have a bit more time and money, Hexayurts can be built from nearly any building material available.
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Does the growing family have anything to learn from a growing business seeking new accommodations? We think so. This post kicks off the new home case study for Apple Computer.

The company wants to build one building that will hold 12,000 Apple employees. “There’s not a single straight piece of glass in this building,” according to Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs. The parking will be mostly underground. Each cafe will feed 3,000 people at one sitting. The campus “energy center” would be the primary source of power and the grid would serve as a backup.
“We have a shot at building the best office building in the world,” Jobs told the Council members, “Architecture students will come here to see this.” Apple hopes to move into the campus in 2015. Additional features include:

• The circular design with a courtyard in the middle and curved glass all the way around.
• Transforming an area that’s 20% landscaping to 80% landscaping by putting most of the building’s parking underground.
• There are 3,700 trees in the area at the moment, Jobs has hired an arborist from Stanford to take the tree population up to 6,000.
• The plan is to build a four-story high building and four-story underground parking structure.
• There will be an auditorium, fitness center and some R & D buildings.
• Jobs plans a 40% increase in Apple employees going from 9,500 today to 13, 000 in 2015.
• He wants to increase the campus’ space 20% from 2.6 million to 3.1 million square feet.
• Surface parking will decrease 90% from 9,800 to 1,200 .
• The building footprint will decrease 30% from 1.4 million to 1 million.

We join the show, already in progress, with a presentation to the Cupertino, California City Council by Steve Jobs.

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Architect Gary Chang in Hong Kong, where apartments are small and expensive due to lack of space, has turned his 330-square-foot apartment into 24 ‘rooms’ via a unique sliding wall system. Through the tracks on the ceiling and the wheels at the bottom, a wall can be moved to reveal a linen closet, which in turn can be moved to reveal a bath tub and a pull down guest bed from above. “The house transforms, and I am always here,” explains Chang. “I don’t move. The house moves for me.”
The sliding panels and walls can create different combinations – 24 in all, where one room can quickly be transformed into another. There is a two-meter wide kitchen found right behind the television and a screening room with a hammock.
The house also has several green features including the three floor-to-ceiling tinted windows which bring the sunlight in, keeping the house bright without having to use any extra lighting source. A mirror that Chang has installed on the ceiling not only makes the tracks less noticeable, but also helps reflect the light throughout the apartment.

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