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AirBnb has been providing travellers the opportunity to see all corners of the globe for a more accessible price. Now, after Airbnb co-founder and chief product officer, Joe Gebbia launched the new project division, coined “Samara” in 2016, the home-sharing community has announced the initiative “Backyard” – designing and building homes from 2019.
Like its platform that was founded in 2008, Airbnb’s Backyard initiative aims to challenge conventional thinking and to create “an entirely new industry”. Along with small prefabricated houses, it is said that the project will also endeavour to create stand-alone homes, multi-unit complexes and even green building materials. “Guided by an ambition to realise more humanistic, future-oriented, and waste-conscious design,” the first prototypes from the Samara division are reportedly set to launch in 2019.
Chatting to Fast Company about the initiative, Gebbia explained that, “Backyard investigates how buildings could utilise sophisticated manufacturing techniques, smart-home technologies, and gains vast insight from the Airbnb community to thoughtfully respond to changing owner or occupant needs over time. Backyard isn’t a house, it’s an initiative to rethink the home. Homes are complex, and we’re taking a broad approach — not just designing one thing, but a system that can do many things.”
Further details on the upcoming project is scarce, but expect a new way of home-sharing to be seen very soon. For more information, visit here.
