Last year Berlin-based design collective Raumlabor rallied architects, students, and the make-your-own crowd to build 22 pop-up cabins from trash collected in Mannheim, Germany. The catch: no cabin could cost more than €250.
Built of recycled wooden pallets, sheets of ridged fiberglass, cast-off lumber, and steel beams, the cabins started popping up in unlikely locations—from rooftops to riverside—throughout the city.
The results were charming—see below—and were rented out as Hotel Shabby Shabby lodging during the Theater der Welt festival last summer. Building on the success of the pop-up buildings, this year Raumlabor will sponsor Shabby Shabby apartments.
Photography via Raumlabor.
Above: On the bank above River Neckar, The Hedonist by Portuguese architects Nuno Pimenta and Frederico Martins is an homage to the architecture of Mies van der Rohe.
Above: This year's design-build competition for Shabby Shabby apartments is underway.
Above: Raised on scaffolding, urban treehouse 3 Lichter Hotel, designed by a French team: Nathalie Fournier, Cécile Roturier, Camille Delaunay, Simon Durand, Benjamin Le Roux, and Mathieu Le Roux.
Above: Living Room for the City by Alex Butterworth, Jennifer Gutteridge, Katherine Nolan, Claudia Fragoso, Felix Schaaf, from Berlin and London.
For more design inspiration from Germany, see:
- 10 Garden Ideas to Steal from Germany.
- Courtyard Comeback: Rescuing a Midcentury Gem in Berlin.
- Studio Visit: At Home with Berlin's Star Florist, Annett Kuhlmann.
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