OVER the course of just a few weeks, the world witnessed two devastating natural disasters that ravaged the United States and the Philippines.
First to strike was Hurricane Matthew. The Category 5 hurricane wreaked havoc in Haiti in early October before unleashing its wrath on the United States, flooding entire cities in Southeastern US and displacing thousands of families in the process. Also, just last week, a great portion of Northern Philippines bore the brunt of Supertyphoon Lawin (international code name Haima), sweeping houses, toppling power lines and uprooting trees along its path.
We Filipinos take pride in being resilient and with our ability to stand up after enduring a rough beating from Mother Nature. But merely being resilient is vastly different from learning how to deal with disasters through long-term planning and disaster-risk management. This is something that has presented a huge opportunity for city planners and real-estate developers to introduce concepts that champion a better future for the entire country insofar as dealing with natural disasters is concerned.
Disaster design as an investment
“Design is a necessary investment for real-estate companies and urban developers because it is what will make their projects work within the context of the rest of the city,” said a good friend of mine, Julia Nebrija, during an interview I had with her a couple of months back. “Design helps bring their developments to life by integrating it into a larger system.”
Julia has just been appointed as the new assistant general manager of the Metropolitan Manila, but I’ve known her as an urban planning and development consultant and a cofounder and executive director of Viva Manila, a nonstock, nonprofit organization who aims to revitalize Manila through arts and culture. There was no better way to emphasize the importance of championing ingenious design standards, especially for a nation hit hard by disasters year in and year out like the Philippines, than how Julia explained it.
Innovation inspired by nature
Speaking of ingenious real-estate design, I remember being left in awe when I first laid my eyes on the Butterfly Housing System, which was one of the featured attractions during the 2014 edition of the Center for International Trade Expositions and Missions’ (Citem) Manila Fame. It was a brainchild of Filipino-American businessman Rogelio “Vonz” Santos, and was codesigned by designer Budji Layug and Arch. Royal Pineda of BUDJI+ROYAL Architecture + Design.
In this column, I’ve talked about how I marveled at the brilliance put into the design of the Butterfly House. A steel-framed temporary housing structure that can be folded for compact shipping and storage and unfolded into an immediately livable structure, the Butterfly House was named as such because it unfolds like a butterfly. The design enables it to be quickly deployed to disaster-stricken areas where the need for immediate shelters is most prominent.
The design fundamentals of the Butterfly House are based on being proactive, reactive and comfortable, all of which we were inspired by both the aftermath of Typhoon Yolanda and the apparent need for a more innovative approach to immediately housing millions. The Butterfly House solution, thus, becomes an innovative solution to plugging the gap for a scalable low-cost yet high-quality interim shelter solution for displaced families.
In the United States, Florida-based modular housing company Cubicco introduced a line of flat-packed homes that is said to have the capability to withstand hurricane winds up to 180 mph (290 kph). The product line is composed of a series of especially designed, self-build home units, beginning with a little microshelter unit (which can be utilized as a stand-alone studio, an additional bedroom facility, or a temporary hurricane shelter).
The prefabricated units are of modular built so they can be easily expanded as needed or moved and relocated in the event of flooding.
“The consequences of some of the global issues we are experiencing: climate-change, dwindling natural resources and exponential population growth are so substantial that most of us tend to get overwhelmed by the thought of how we could contribute into solving some of these daunting issues,” a statement from Cubicco, adding, “Our pledge is to reinvent what a sustainable home can be within a sustainable neighborhood.”
Building for the worst has almost always been the guiding vision of a lot of real-estate developers, both here in the Philippines and in various parts of the globe. As the so-called new normal sets in, developers and other related sectors are doing their best to answer to the pressing demands of the times by taking inspiration from proven blueprints that only nature can provide.
Image credits: New Atlas, Cubicco, Euronews