Temporary Housing Made from Recycled Paper Tubes: Fid-Bau Portal

Temporary Housing Made from Recycled Paper Tubes

A Comparative Study of Housing “Paper Log House” and Its Adaptations to Different Contexts

Carbonari, Luana Toralles / Librelotto, Lisiane Ilha

Abstract Natural disasters have been an increasingly present issue in the media and in daily life of society. Due to lack of planning and organization, the damage is intensified, destroying infrastructures and habitable structures. In addition, these damages have generated a large number of homeless, resulting in the need for temporary housing. In response to this, the architect Shigeru Ban developed in 1995 the project of a temporary housing named “Paper Log House” for the homeless after an earthquake in Japan. This housing was built with recycled paper tubes to reduce the building costs, speed up its construction and reuse an available material, minimizing its impact on the environment. Subsequently, it was used as a response to disasters in different places, being modified to adapt to each context. This paper aims to perform a comparative analysis of these temporary housing used in 1995 in Japan, in 2000 in Turkey, in 2001 in India and in 2014 in the Philippines. For this, a literature review was performed, identifying concepts regarding the use of recycled paper tubes in Shigeru Ban’s architecture and the design and construction characteristics of the first project for Japan. After that, an analysis was carried out comparing the four cases. With the results it can be concluded that the cultural, economic and environmental aspects of each context are of great importance in the project. Thus, priority should be given to the use of local materials, constructive agility, comfort and privacy to users, aesthetic quality, participation of the local population, recycling of materials, among others.