They lived 3 years in a basement. Then built their dream backyard home by Kirsten Dirksen on February 10, 2026 For 3 years, Mai Tran and Le Pham lived in a 300-square-foot basement beneath the house they’d just bought in …
Couple buys whole ghost village, tells others to join & fix their own ruin by Kirsten Dirksen on February 1, 2026 On a freezing winter day in northern Spain, we arrived in Bárcena de Bureba, a ghost village in the remote, …
The housing ladder broke ages ago. What can prefab & modular do? by Nicolás Boullosa on January 29, 2026 Blame interest rates. Blame investors. Easier than admitting America stopped building enough homes, never modernized construction, and quietly relies on …
When the alarm never stops: attention in an age of permanent emergency by Nicolás Boullosa on January 22, 2026 In a time of constant alerts, moral urgency, and outrage, attention dissolves into a permanent state of alarm, eroding judgment. …
Military couple turns forsaken mountain ruin into off-grid family oasis by Kirsten Dirksen on January 18, 2026 After leaving Navy careers behind—Maartje (18 years) and Clemens (22 years)—this couple packed their lives into 8 suitcases, sold or …
The elephant’s belly: an urchin living inside Napoleon’s monument by Nicolás Boullosa on January 15, 2026 Some monuments were never meant to be inhabited. Yet in 19th-century Paris, a child lived inside the hollow body of …
Quitting 9-to-5 to build genius off-grid homestead, permitted & loan-free by Kirsten Dirksen on January 11, 2026 Five years ago, Mathieu Munsch walked away from the “normal” script— rent, bills, loans, a 40-hour workweek (35 in France)— …
Normal until it breaks: A modern life with few redundancies by Nicolás Boullosa on January 10, 2026 How car crashes, blackouts, and bureaucratic glitches reveal the fragility of our optimized world—and why resilience now means living with …
Why we still want humans to hesitate: preparation vs. memorization by Nicolás Boullosa on December 30, 2025 In an age of bland scripts—human and machine—we’re oddly hungry for the stumble. The pause, the self-correction, the sentence that …
Got factory ruin. Now builds Nordic prefab homes with industrial precision by Kirsten Dirksen on December 28, 2025 A few months ago, we visited Vipp and met its founder and owner, Jette Egelund, who gave us a full …
