Building Blocks: India’s First DIY Shipping Container Home
Shipping container homes have gained huge popularity in the western world, but they weren’t implemented in India until 2011. That was when sports instructor Kameshwar Rao built his unique home in Ramamurthy Nagar, Bangalore. He claims it to be India’s very first shipping container home.
Composed of four separate shipping containers stacked in a two-level L-shape, the home provides Rao and his family with the space that they need. One container is a living room, another an office, and the two remaining containers house the bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen. Little personal details make the home truly stand out: a window made of a bullock cart wheel and recycled bottles, a sink made of an old truck’s funnel, and doors that are built outward to allow for a little extra floor space.
When Rao began building his home, it was such a novel concept in the area that no one really believed it could work. The metal containers were thought to be incompatible with the region’s weather, and Rao’s neighbors believed that the home would be intolerable in the summer heat and winter cold.
According to the family, this assumption couldn’t be further from the truth. The home is comfortable and just as livable as a conventional house, but offers plenty of advantages over conventional construction. It is eco-friendly, easy to build, and can be disassembled and moved whenever the owner needs to relocate. Plenty of windows and cross-ventilation keep the metal home from becoming too hot.
Rao was so taken with the idea of shipping container homes that he started a company designing and building container homes: Container Solutions India. He designs and constructs shipping container structures that are used as offices, residences, climbing walls, and even swimming pools. This is a perfect example of one man’s vision enacting positive change for a very large number of people.
