YUMING BAI
Fabrication · Architecture and Landscape

Bao House

A mobile micro-dwelling for three, built for the Get It Louder 2012 exhibition.

Year
2012
Role
Design and fabrication with dot Architects
Location
Taikoo Li, Beijing
Tags
installation · material experiment · digital fabrication
Bao House parked in a Beijing street at dusk, its white foam skin glowing
Photo by Yan Chen.

Bao House was made for the Get It Louder 2012 exhibition in Beijing: a dwelling small enough to be pedalled through the city on a tricycle, yet able to hold three people.

Bao House on the street

The skin

The shell is spray polyurethane foam. Applied as a liquid inside a fabric mould, it expands many times its volume and sets into a lightweight, insulating, bulging surface, the “bao” that gives the house its name.

Spray foam expanding through the fabric mould

Making the shell

Inside

A mattress on the floor and a transparent polycarbonate panel in the roof. The layout is as simple as the object: sleep, light, human power.

Plan and elevation