My night in a tube home, low-cost housing concept for Hong Kong – cosy, but noisy and, in midwinter, chilly
Architect had brainwave on a building site; the result is the OPod, a 100 square foot, US$15,000 home formed from two lengths of concrete drainpipe and envisioned as temporary accommodation for a family. The Post is first to give it a try
When I told friends I was planning to spend a night in a renovated water pipe, some were understandably concerned. They needn’t have worried; their image of me sleeping rough in a rusty, old sewer pipe had no bearing on reality. I was booked into an OPod.
A 100 square foot (9.3 square metre) experimental, low-cost home made from two repurposed concrete water pipes, the OPod is the brainchild of Hong Kong architect James Law. Equipped with a small bathroom, tiny kitchen, shelving and a couch that converts into a bed, the micro flat is an example of how the city could tackle its lack of sufficient affordable housing.
Still at the prototype stage, the OPod had never accommodated anyone overnight, I was told, so I nominated myself to be its first guinea pig.
Law, founder of James Law Cybertecture, dreamed up the OPod while on a construction site. “I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be funky if I could get some of these tubes and convert them into an experimental house’,” he says. “That’s how the OPod came about – seeing these construction materials and also constantly worrying, like everyone else, how to save for a place to live in Hong Kong.”
A home you can buy for US$15,000? It’s not a pipe dream in world’s priciest real estate market, Hong Kong
The OPod costs around US$15,000 – the cost of purchasing the mass-produced pipes and fitting them out – and Law bills it as an affordable option to help ease the city’s housing crisis. He says the durability of the pipes means they can be stacked on top of each other in tight, unused spaces in the city.