Blockchain, 3D printing and other digital technologies are key to making shared housing models take off, according to research by IKEA's innovation lab Space10.
In the report聽Imagine: Exploring the Brave New World of Shared Living, the Copenhagen-based studio states that digital platforms and devices are essential to making co-living widespread enough to impact the global housing crisis.
"Digital platforms can help challenge the entire housing industry of today," explained Space10 co-founder Simon Caspersen.
"Our current answers seem insufficient and outdated; after all, the housing debate is currently narrowly focused on finding ways to build more homes," he told Dezeen. "As important as that is, we also need to think hard about new ways of living and turn our challenges into opportunities." Sharing economy lays foundations for co-living
The report sets out four criteria聽that it claims can help co-living models become more widely adopted. Digital technology is one of them.
Under the heading Mobilise Digital Tools, it states that digital technology聽can transform the design, construction and management of co-living developments.
"The rise of the sharing economy suggests that people are ready to share more than we thought" says the report
"Technology can help enable shared living," reads the report.
"The rise of the sharing economy suggests that people are ready to share more than we thought ? and that there is a bigge...