Old shipping containers are plentiful in the U.S., and architect Brian Stark knows exactly what to do with them.
He began by designing buildings out of old shipping containers, which are scattered across the streetscape of Phoenix. His projects are as much about cost-saving as they are about being environmentally friendly, with the long-term goal of helping tackle America’s affordable housing crisis.
“We’re not consuming or producing that steel, it already exists,” Stark said. “There’s a huge ability to save. And that’s how I think we have to start thinking that way, is using what we have versus just keep on consuming.”
How the design process works
Stark took his concept a step further and began designing homes for Phoenix’s unhoused people out of the steel containers. The project was developed for the City of Phoenix with sustainable living company Steel + Spark, and the housing units are called “X-WING” shelters as an ode to the unit’s “X” design.
Each “X-WING” is made up of four containers, topped with solar panels and joined together in an “X” shape that also creates courtyards for its residents when placed beside another unit. Each container has five rooms, with one resident per room. The units are fully air-conditioned, which is crucial for a city that reaches record temperatures every year.
Most importantly, the shelters only take a week to construct.
Jay Spicer, who lives in one of the “X-WING” rooms with his dog, Dino, qualified for the unit by staying sober for eight months and holding a job as a forklift operator.
Though it’s a small space, it’s his own.
“It is my space for now,” Spicer says, “we keep the door shut, it stays nice and cool in here.”
Approximately 771,480 people in the U.S. experienced homelessness on a single night in 2024, an 18% increase from 2023, according to data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
In Arizona, approximately 14,737 people experienced homelessness on a single night in 2024, up 3% from 2023, according to the Homelessness in Arizona Annual Report published by the Arizona Department of Economic Security.
Plans for shipping containers
Stark doesn’t plan on stopping with the “X-WING” shelters, either. His next big plan is to tackle the country’s affordable housing crisis by building a 105-unit apartment complex out of shipping containers, specifically for low-income or unhoused senior citizens.
Despite challenges with selling his ideas to certain developers, Stark can tell he’s making a huge difference for people.
“It’s great talking to people who are living in the X-WING that say, ‘I can hear myself think for the first time, and I’m improving my life,'” Stark says, “to be part of the solution is great, it’s unbelievable.”
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