Design graduate Tanya Shukstelinsky has proposed a new type of affordable urban housing, with people living between two sheets of suspended fabric (+ slideshow).

Shukstelinsky's Cocoon project features sheets of material with stairs and handholds stitched into them, allowing occupants to move between different living zones.

The result is extremely thin multi-storey dwellings that Shukstelinsky describes as "temporary living spaces for urban nomads".

The designer created the installation as part of her final year project at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem.

"Last year, during one of our studio classes named Cocoon, students were asked to design a private space in a public area," Shukstelinsky explains.

"I came up with an idea for a space between two stitched layers of fabric. A person who lives in the space can move upon the stitches. The stitches are dividing the fabric into different areas - dining area, sleeping area and bath."

The concept could be used to create affordable accommodation in expensive urban areas, Shukstelinsky says. "This concept of a vertical and narrow dwelling can be used in dense urban spaces with expensive real estate. Also, integration with modern technologies and smart textiles can provide the minimum we need for temporary accommodation."

Other micro homes we've published include a motorised compact-living cocoon by Greg Lynn that rotates to provide space for relaxing, sleeping and bathing, and a modular system with cross-shaped capsules that can be flipped around to turn a living room into an office or bathroom.

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