architecture

A House Built from Bottles

Two college students develop an idea that could solve two of the world's major problems: a lack of affordable housing and an overabundance of plastic bottles

People around the world guzzle about 50 billion gallons of bottled water a year, and then toss billions of those plastic bottles into the trash heap instead of the recycling bin. Matt Naples and Peter Zummo think they can take this lemon of a fact and turn it into lemonade—or rather, take those discarded water bottles and turn them into chairs, shelves, or houses for the world’s poor.

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City of the Future

Architects imagine what San Francisco might look like in 2108 (hint, we finally get those flying cars)

What will San Francisco look like 100 years from now? According to the winning entry in a "city of the future" contest, residents will live in a forest of sinuous towers.

IwamotoScott Architecture took home the $10,000 prize for its "Hydro-Net" design, which also envisions an underground web of carbon-nanotube-walled tunnels where people travel in hydrogen-fueled hover-cars.

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Grow Your Second Home

Designers plant the seeds for a high-tech version of the Swiss Family Treehouse. Click inside for video

If solar power and recycled building materials just aren’t green enough for you, the brains behind the Fab Tree Hab might have the perfect pad. Architects Mitchell Joachim and Javier Arbona, along with environmental engineer Lara Greden, have designed a house that will grow from a few seedlings into a two-story, water-recycling, energy-efficient abode. The Fab Tree Hab,
a mix of ancient and ultramodern technology, isn’t
merely environmentally friendly.

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Hot Wings

Design trend alert: turning scrapped airplanes into architectural marvels

What happens to airplanes when they die? Though it's fun to imagine them flying up to some big hangar in the sky, the truth is that of the 200 that are retired worldwide every year, most end up in scrap-metal graveyards. Some are even simply abandoned to rust next to landing strips, becoming the FAA equivalent of junked front-yard jalopies.

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PPX: The PopSci Predictions Exchange

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    Will the Phoenix lander find verifiable signs of life on the surface of Mars by January 1, 2009?

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    Will the HTC Touch Diamond arrive in North America by September 31st?

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