THE PHANTOM ECO-HOUSE by Diller Scofidio + Renfro
by Jorge Chapa 
Amongst the articles featured yesterday on the New York Times Magazine was a proposal for an Eco-house, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro (previously seen here at Inhabitat) in conjunction with Atelier Ten, which looked at what a possible house from the future would look like.
More of a thought process, than an actual proposal, the brief provided to them asked the following: What would you do to create a house that let you live as guilt-free as possible, in a luxury house that is sustainable. A brief which sounds like an oxymoron, after all, could you be sustainable and continue living like you do right now? Well, they came up with some really cool ideas as too how we may see ourselves living in the future.
The article describes an imaginary couple and their lifestyle through any particular day. They wake up, eat breakfast, turn on the lights, take long showers, charge up all their gadgets (it’s the future after all), exercise, use their pool, work in their home office, etc. It takes their supposed power consumption and compares it to the proposed power production that the house would be providing. It makes some assumptions as to what future technologies would provide and creates some of their own (I want a roto-fridge), as well as proposing some new uses for existing ones, such as the conjunction of a GPS system and a home-automated system to shutdown the house when empty and turn it on when occupied.
It isn’t just a simple thought process though. The ideas were brought to concept stage, looking at how everything would fit together to work in conjunction with each other. A rain collector takes the water and filters it, using it for the house, which then takes the effluent for the garden, toilets, washing and the pool. It is a very intriguing article which provides plenty to think about. Could a house like this be possible soon?
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Don’t be fooled by the nice drawings, digging in a giant pool like that in solid rock would require an enormous amount of effort. Also in the future one of the main problems will be how to get fresh water, leaving it to vaporise in the baking sun isn’t what i call durable . I would think a house of future could maybe learn from the past, to get trough a hot day you need a house with mass to accumulate the heat and then cool it at night. Water can be present in a roman patio type of way, to cool the rest of the house and make lush garden with seclusion from the overcrowed world of the future/present.