The Better Shelter is an initiative supported by the IKEA Foundation and the UNHCR. It is often referred to as the IKEA shelter. The designers of Better Shelter aimed to create a shelter that was better than the UNHCR tents (Scott-Smith, 2019).
The shelters are made from a basic frame of quality steel tubes held together by sturdy brackets (Tom-Scott, 2019). The walls are firm plastic, with a door that one can lock and knock on (Scott-Smith, 2019).
Figure 1: Better Shelter components. Source: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/04/27/ikea-unhcr-refugee-better-shelter-redesign-safety-fears-flaws/
With 17.5m2 of space (Fairs, 2017), the structure is large enough to house a family of five (Hambrick, 2017) and high enough that people can stand up inside (Scott-Smith, 2019). The Better Shelter costs 1250USD and all the parts are delivered in flat-packs to be assembled on site in about four hours (Fairs, 2017; Scott-Smith, 2019). These aspects of the design make the Better Shelter more private, secure, dignified, allows somewhat easy transportation and a longer life than UNHCR tents.
Despite these positive aspects however, there is also evidence of design flaws that were ignored. In an analysis carried out in Ethiopia, some design and durability flaws resulted in DIY repairs done by refugees (Fairs, 2017;). Also reported was the lack of wheelchair access, poor fire safety, draughtiness and lack of groundsheet, which makes the process of erecting the shelter a little more complex than UNHCR tents (McLaughlin, 2017; Fairs, 2017).
Figure 2: Better Shelter packing. Source: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/jan/27/why-ikea-flatpack-refugee-shelter-won-design-of-the-year
Considering these pitfalls, the designers of Better Shelter have indeed discussed and expected to continue improving on the product (McLaughlin, 2017). For example, after “an embarrassing false start” (Herscher & Monk, 2021, pp. 7) with the walls proving to be highly flammable, version 2.0 of the Better Shelter now meets the relevant SPHERE standards.
Due to the relevance of the Better Shelter in today’s world, it has also won the Design Museum’s design of the year award in 2017 (Scott-Smith, 2019). As Scott-Smith argues (2019), however, the people who gave it this award have not been the ones using the Better Shelter, and lack the experiential knowledge of how the design performs in reality. While the design claims to be ‘universal’, in reality, there is only compromise when something caters for such a variety of possible environments. The Better Shelter was criticized by architects for being insufficient and by humanitarians for being excessive, claiming that shelter is a process, not a product1 (Davis, 1978; Davis & Alexander, 2015).
These frictions that are discussed reveal a certain tension that is almost always present in humanitarian products, especially the one between standardisation and adaptability and modularity (Pascucci, 2020).
Concluding Remarks
All in all, in these scenarios there will never be an ideal solution. The ideal solution is that people are not in camps in the first place, and that there is no need for ‘Better Shelter’ at all. Deciding to design and tackle a problem such as shelter for refugees will inevitably not cater to all contexts completely. The solution, will almost always throw in sharp relief that which it doesn’t do, partly because it is the underlying root cause that really needs solving. In the meantime, that seems to be the tricky work of shelter and humanitarian work; finding a satisfactory middle-ground.
Figure 3: Interior photo of the Better Shelter in use. Source: https://www.dezeen.com/2017/04/29/united-nations-admits-10000-ikea-better-shelter-refugees-mothballed-fire-fears/
Notes
1 In their book, Recovery from Disaster (2015), Davis & Alexander observe the need “to understand that effective recovery from disasters, sheltering and housing is best regarded as a seamless process rather than as a set of isolated options or the delivery of tangible products.
References
Davis, I. (1978). Shelter after Disaster. Oxford PolytechnicPress
Davis, I., & Alexander, D. (2015). Recovery from disaster. Taylor & Francis Group. Hambrick
Fairs, M. (2017, 27 April). Ten thousand IKEA refugee shelters left unused over fire fears, United Nations admits. dezeen. https://www.dezeen.com/2017/04/29/united-nations-admits-10000-ikea-better-shelter-refugees-mothballed-fire-fears/
Herscher, A., & Monk, D. B. (2021). The Global Shelter Imaginary: Ikea Humanitarianism and Rightless Relief. University of Minnesota Press.
McLaughlin, A. (2017, 3 May). Ikea Foundation refugee shelter to be redesigned following safety concerns. Design Week (Online). https://www.designweek.co.uk/issues/1-7-may-2017/ikea-foundation-refugee-shelter-redesigned-following-safety-concerns/
Pascucci, E. (2021). Refugee Shelter in a Logistical World: Designing Goods for Supply‐Chain Humanitarianism. Antipode, 53(1), 260-278. https://doi.org/10.1111/anti.12680
Scott‐Smith, T. (2019). Beyond the boxes: Refugee shelter and the humanitarian politics of life. American ethnologist, 46(4), 509-521. https://doi.org/10.1111/amet.12833