A refugee shelter developed by the UN and Ikea is the best design of 2016

The awarding of the top prize to the refugee shelter comes in the backdrop of surging nationalist sentiment across the West.

By: News Desk |
January 27, 2017 9:53 pm

A foldable refugee shelter jointly developed by the United Nations and furniture giant Ikea has won a top award for best design of 2016. The shelter has been conferred on with the Beazley Design of the Year Award, presented annually by London-based Design Museum for excellence in design across spheres of fashion, product and architecture among others. The awarding of the top prize to the refugee shelter comes in the backdrop of surging nationalist sentiment across the West.

The refugee shelter can reportedly be assembled in as less as four hours, making it a viable answer to housing crisis that’s being faced by millions of refugees and asylum seekers fleeing war and violence across the world.

Each shelter can accommodate a family of up to five people and includes a solar panel to power lights. Sixteen thousand of these shelters have been manufactured since production started in 2016, with many being transported to financially and politically troubled countries including Iraq, Djibouti, Greece and Niger among other countries.

“Better Shelter tackles one of the defining issues of the moment: providing shelter in an exceptional situation whether caused by violence or disaster,” a juror, Jana Scholze, who is an associate professor of curating contemporary design at Kingston University, reportedly said in a statement.

“Providing not only a design, but secure manufacture as well as distribution makes this project relevant and even optimistic. It shows the power of design to respond to the conditions we are in and transform them.”

Other nominees for this year’s Beazley Award included an Adidas running shoe made out of recycled plastic retrieved from the sea and the Universidad de Ingenieria y Tecnologia building in Lima, among others.

The @DesignMuseum has awarded this flat-packed refugee shelter with the Beazley Design of the Year Award https://t.co/CaeevU1Lh7 pic.twitter.com/x0OK1npUfR

— designjunction (@_designjunction) January 27, 2017

(Source: Twitter/designjunction)

Some other designs that also made it to the short-list:

#OneDesignADay – Wastberg w153 Ilé Lamp. Nominated for the 2016 Beazley Design Award! pic.twitter.com/GSIPPehCdX

— Tom J Potter (@TomUtility) September 6, 2016

(Source: Twitter/Tom J Potter)

Meet the nominees of the Beazley Designs of the year #award @DesignMuseum https://t.co/hSW6T91Xoz #newdesignmuseum #design pic.twitter.com/EajECIm1Up

— Cheval Residences (@Cheval_London) November 10, 2016

(Source: Twitter/Cheval Residences)