Skip to content

Redesigning our spaces after the coronavirus: part three

  • by JW

Converting 20 newly constructed office buildings in east London into 2,000 individual cube offices.

A pop-up community of 11 single-berth and fully self-contained units; a city centre now visibly devoid of rough sleepers.

.

There are all sorts of ingenious ideas emerging on how to live with the current crisis:

Redesigning our spaces after the coronavirus – Vision Group for Sidmouth

Redesigning our spaces after the coronavirus: part two – Vision Group for Sidmouth

.

Creating ‘tiny spaces’ is proving controversial:

Turning shops and offices into ‘tiny homes’ – Vision Group for Sidmouth

.

However, ‘creative’ these tiny spaces definitely are – and perhaps something we will have to learn to live with.

As a correspondent says, though, “The future looks lonely.”

Here are two very different projects they have just sent in, which address all sorts of issues, as well as the fundamental one of keeping us safe.

.

Firstly, from London:

20 offices turned into 2,000 individual pods for post-Covid working

Entrepreneur Xu Weiping is building 3-metre square workspaces with a chair, desk, fridge, microwave and fold-down bed, in east London

Welcome to cube city. Xu Weiping, a Chinese multimillionaire, has a vision for the future of office work in the post-Covid-19 pandemic world: thousands of office pods where each person works in their own self-contained 3m x 3m cube.

Xu reckons the coronavirus pandemic will have such a fundamental impact on the way people work that he is converting 20 newly constructed office buildings in east London into 2,000 of the individual cube offices.

If the cubes, which feature a kettle, fridge, microwave, videoscreen and fold-down bed as well as a chair and desk, prove popular Xu plans to convert all of his £1.7bn 35-acre regeneration project in east London into more than 10,000 of the individual cubes…

20 offices turned into 2,000 individual pods for post-Covid working | Business | The Guardian

.

And from Cornwall:

Inside the pop-up cabins that have eradicated Truro’s homeless problem

‘We are absolutely gobsmacked at the success so why stop doing something that’s so good?’

The coronavirus pandemic has had a life-changing effect on so many but one group of people who found themselves most vulnerable as life locked down were the homeless and rough sleepers.

As the majority of us were able to shield and socially distance in the relative comforts of our own homes, what was to become of those living on our streets?

As a result of the crisis, in late March the Government made a pledge and requested that all local authorities in England and Wales offer accommodation to those who were sleeping rough as part of efforts to help stop the spread of the virus.

Known as the ‘Everybody In’ campaign, it formed part of Cornwall Council’s emergency response, delivered in partnership with Cornwall Housing Ltd, which acted swiftly to ensure that everyone known to be sleeping rough in Cornwall was offered accommodation. As a result something miraculous has happened in the centre of Truro, which many residents don’t even know about.

Carrick Cabins is a pop-up community of 11 single-berth and fully self-contained units, with showers and cooking facilities located a stone’s throw from the city’s busy shopping centre; a city centre which is now visibly devoid of rough sleepers…

Inside the pop-up cabins that have eradicated Truro’s homeless problem – Cornwall Live

With quite a knock-on effect:

Police say homeless pods have ‘massively reduced’ issues in Truro – Cornwall Live

Cornwall has more homeless on the streets than any other county in the UK – Cornwall Live