CORE was the winner for the AIA Designing Recovery Design Competition for Disaster Resilient Housing. The premise of this design was to create an affordable, sustainable and disaster resilient home to address the climatic challenges of a tornado.
The result of the design process was a home that balanced safety and aesthetic comfort.
CORE: A disaster resilient home
As architects, we are challenged by the extreme forces of climate change and are engaged to join those on the frontlines of disaster prevention and recovery. Designs for disaster relief & resilience will build integrity in natural disaster-prone communities and offer security and affordability.
Joplin, Missouri is a disaster-prone community. CORE is an architectural concept created to keep people safe. A typical wood-framed home cannot withstand a powerful tornado. In just four seconds, homes are demolished and in minutes the landscape is scarred.
Without disaster-resilient structures, residents are forced to salvage belongings and relocate. CORE House provides a high-performance typology that supports a healthy community, provides security and is based on the following design principles:
CORE is a formal translation of the Ernhaus, a traditional small town Missouri vernacular. CORE is the intersection of two single-cell homes: the Safe House and Perimeter House. Like a ‘hearth’, the Safe House is centrally located and divides the Perimeter House into public and private wings. These wings are connected by a South-facing breezeway designed to capture solar energy and reduce mechanical need.
The envelope of the Safe House is designed like that of a safe room with a hardened structure; it contains all that is necessary for a family to recover quickly and live for an extended period of time until rebuild is possible. The wall is detailed to meet FEMA’s criteria for “near-absolute protection” in extreme weather while the Perimeter House is designed with economical light-frame construction. Openings are strategically sized and located for wind-load, to provide visual connections to the natural environment and manage seasonal heat loads.
Flying debris causes a large percentage of the destruction in a tornado. The Safe House contains half of all potential ‘heavy debris’ building materials (bathroom fixtures, kitchen appliances, etc.), making CORE a ‘good’ neighbour.
Prior to a tornado, residents stock the Safe House emergency supply closet. In the event of a tornado warning, residents move mattresses to the Safe House for use on the murphy beds; tornado shutters and doors are closed, and main utility valves are shut off.
CORE is designed with concrete block made with carbon emissions sequestering potential. All construction materials are manufactured within 500 miles, aiding the local economy, reducing embodied energy and CORE’s impact on climate change. Incorporated passive systems and water harvesting reduce the amount of grid energy and natural resources required to run the home.
CORE as a prototype is portable: beyond Joplin, beyond Tornados, and beyond the single-family typology to a multi-family typology for dense urban environments.
