Inflatable Shelters

Process

Louie Adamian and Satchel Sieniewicz

The Inflatable Shelter: a lightweight inexpensive shelter for displaced people that attempts to improve their quality of life by offering thermal insulation.   

There are over 12 million Syrians forcibly displaced from their homes, and over 25 million refugees worldwide. Refugees' quality of life is often overlooked.: people do not think about what it is like to live in a refugee camp in a tent with no utilities or amenities. The Inflatable Shelter is made from Tyvek and Mylar to be inexpensive and light, and the air bladders that inflate to offer thermal insulation. The initial prototype focused on the tent material and form, and on different methods of adhering the Tyvek and Mylar together. A large portion of design time was spent on exploring different methods of adhering the Tyvek and mylar together. Future versions will integrate more features into the design to make the tent more like a modern house, including. Flexible solar panels on the tent roof to charge batteries that will power LED lights embedded into the walls of the tent.

The two materials need to be strong enough to handle being outside all the time, the adhesive needs to be flexible so the fabric is still flexible., and the gap between the two should be as small as possible so the material can fold up to flat pack or be stuffed in a bag.