The prestigious bi-annual INDEX: Award has announced the five winners of the world’s largest monetary prize in design, one of which–in the “Home” category–is architect Alejandro Aravena’s ELEMENTAL Monterrey project, an innovative model for social housing that consists of building partially completed homes on prime real estate and allows residents to adapt and expand each property themselves. The model has also been implemented in Mexico.
Read more about the project at INDEX: and in this Design Indaba interview with Alejandro Aravena, in which he discusses how the model can work in low-income communities and the difficulties in making it a reality. Below you can see his presentation at Design Indaba 2010 where he talks about his work.