10x10 Housing selected to participate in International Biennale Rotterdam 2009 - Squat City

We were invited to enter the 2009 Rotterdam Architecture Biennale's Squat City competition, and we have now been selected to participate! The following are the competition's criteria as outlined in the call for contribution:

The projects submitted for the Squat City Competition should contribute the agenda of the 'Open City' by proposing inventive design strategies and techniques pertaining to informal urban development.

The call goes out to projects from the fields of architecture and urban design that are based on or that support bottom-up practices and that encourage the self-empowerment of local actors, and that help formalize and legalize such developments.

They qualify by being:
- economically sustainable, e.g. by creating jobs and supporting
social business.
- ecologically and energetically sustainable, e.g. by reducing
waste. or energy and material consumption.
- socially sustainable, e.g. by creating education facilities and
enabling communities to become self-reliant.

All these criteria are congruent with the aims of the Design Indaba 10x10 Low Cost Housing Project, so Squat City is an exciting opportunity to interact with other like-minded initiatives. Watch this space for notification of our online mini-documentary that will be going up at http://www.urbaninform.net.

10x10 House featured on treehugger.com's Best of Green: Design + Architecture list

Luyanda Mpahlwa's 10x10 design is featured as Best Third-World Design on treehugger.com's annual Best of Green: Design + Architecture list. Check us out here.

The Design Indaba 10x10 Low Cost Housing project featured a year ago on Treehugger, too. You'll find the first post here.

Photo: Rosemary Lombard

Design Indaba 10x10 Housing included in Green Design book

The Design Indaba 10x10 Low Cost Housing Project is included in Dezeen editor-in-chief Marcus Fairs' new book, Green Design! Buy a copy online at Dezeenbooks.

Here's the blurb from the publishers, Carlton Books:

From vast architectural projects to modest one-off pieces of salvaged furniture, "Green Design" shows how the design world is responding to the environmental challenges of the twenty-first century. Emerging trends in green design are covered, such as recycling and ethical sourcing. Also considered is the parallel issue of social sustainability, where the welfare of factory workers is given equal importance to environmental issues, and the idea of Cradle to Cradle enterprises, where a product can be reused over several product histories or unending 'loops'. By showcasing existing green innovations as well as visionary projects that will be built in the coming years, including the world's first zero-carbon city, "Green Design" paints a future where technology and ethics merge.

About the Author
Lecturer, entrepreneur, curator and award-winning journalist Marcus Fairs, formerly founding editor of icon magazine, is editor of online design magazine Dezeen. He has appeared on BBC TV, notably in his documentary about Philippe Starck (2003) and Home (2006). In autumn 2007 Marcus devised and curated the Trash Luxe exhibition of recycled design at Liberty's London. He lives in London, England.

Dezeen are giving away ten copies of Green Design. To stand a chance to win one, go HERE. The competition closes on 8 April 2009.