Shipping Container

The home was built by two construction workers and the couple themselves, who were familiarized with the construction process and had backgrounds in industrial engineering. “We did not have blueprints for this design, and created only a 3-D model to guile them along the way,” Saxe says.

The recycled shipping containers were sourced from the Pacific Port of Caldera in Costa Rica. “Discarded shipping containers are all over the world and cost relatively little,” Saxe says. “With a bit of creativity and understanding of local building techniques, the interiors can be modified for any client.”

Atelier Riri devised a creative way to make living inside a shipping container in Indonesia’s tropical climate both comfortable and economical. The architects layered recycled pine, glass wool, and planter mesh on top of the home to help keep temperatures down.

The 1,668-square-foot three-bedroom home is made of four colorful, crisscrossed containers equipped with a simple ventilation system that facilitates a constant breeze.

Natural light pours into the open-plan house, which is outfitted with low-cost materials like polished concrete floors and recycled metal railings.

The hobby room features a custom desk and shelving system that Atelier Riri designed and manufactured themselves. A custom frame holds the family’s tools and other objects on the eastern wall.

In one of the home’s three bathrooms, a TOTO toilet is illuminated by LED light fixtures from OSRAM. Simple square-shaped skylights and windows allow natural light to fill the space.

A cherry red game room gives way to a second green space on the roof, which can be used as an extension of the indoor space.

Covered with wire mesh, the green roof will continue to vegetate over time.

The BetaBox mobile prototyping lab is outfitted with a 3D printer, a CNC mill, a laser cutter, and other tools for innovating.

Opting for IKEA appliances helped rein in the budget, but the home's greatest cost-saving measure may have been Mike's background in construction. His degree in architectural engineering enabled him to play an active role in both the ideation and execution.

In the open-plan kitchen, a garage door can be retracted to take advantage of the balmy California climate and bring the outdoors in. Mike's wife, Shawn, appreciates the home's proximity to hiking trails.

The flooring, doors, and bathroom vanity were sourced from the local Habitat for Humanity ReStore.

The 800-square-foot house is among the first shipping container residences in San Diego County, according to Mike. He hopes it will soon by joined by a larger container home on the property, at which point it will become the guesthouse.

“The owners wanted it to look like a shipping yard that someone had made a restaurant around, in the same way that local artists in the River Arts District have repurposed factory spaces into art studios,” said Project Architect Myles Alexander. The three-story structure lets in light from the highest level, where the bottoms of the containers were removed.

“We wanted it to feel open and spacious,” Alexander said. Much of the work on the containers was completed off-site by SG Blocks, and then delivered for construction. It's clad in Cor-Ten weathering seel.

Students at work in the BetaBox on the Duke University campus in 2014.

With white-board walls, the BetaBox is set up to encourage creative thinking.

The look of the BetaBox was a collaboration between Nicholas Sailer, BetaVersity's director of creative, who studied industrial design at the College of Design in Raleigh, North Carolina; and Michael Hobgood, an architectural designer and the company's director of operations.