3D home printer opens $1M competition as ‘affordability moonshot’

Austin-based 3D-printed home manufacturer Icon is looking for designers and college students from all over the world to propose advancements in architecture that could bring the cost of homes under $99,000.

The company announced its Initiative 99 contest on Wednesday at South by Southwest, offering a $1 million prize to winners of a yearlong competition that is expected to result in the top submission being built as part of the company’s projects.

Icon said creating housing for less than $100,000 per unit will cross a threshold that makes affordable homes and relief structures for people experiencing homelessness far more accessible and accepted by local planners and governments.

Melodie Yashar, Icon’s vice president of building design and performance, said additive manufacturing by itself can achieve lower costs, but ample room for improvement still exists in the kinds of homes that are created.

“We’re at a point in our technology development where our system is mature enough, where we can anticipate and we actually have a good sense of the time and cost savings that are introduced when you have economies of scale relative to housing, large developments, creating houses in large developments,” she said.

The contest announced Wednesday “is basically opening up the design space to universities, as well as architecture firms, to help us explore what’s possible at this price point,” Yashar said. “We also want to open up the design space to others to identify the most needed users, communities and potential homeowners for these affordable homes – and not only locally, but from a global perspective.”

The competition will open in May, and its first phase will coincide with the same time frame as fall semester for colleges and universities.

Icon is involved with housing projects across the country, in addition to having contracts with the defense industry and space exploration efforts. Its largest local project is based in Georgetown, where it has seven machines printing 100 homes.

Yashar said advancements made through the designs submitted as part of the contest could lead to substantial improvements in the availability of affordable housing in Austin and other cities where high  home prices trigger suburban flight and homelessness.

“Additive manufacturing hardware and technology developers have been at an arm’s length from introducing design solutions that are most needed within communities,” she said.

“We want to bridge those two worlds and show that we are taking responsibility not only for the designs themselves, but also realizing them where they’re most needed. So we’re trying to bridge that gap between what happens by developers and city planners, and with contractors for built work and for those projects as they’re realized,” she said.

Michelle Addington, dean of the School of Architecture at the University of Texas, said unit cost is just one of many factors to consider in improving housing affordability and reducing homelessness, with financial stability and social networks also playing a large role.

She said Icon’s advancements in making quality prefabricated housing that is created on-site without significant transportation costs represents a major shift in how housing is delivered to the places it is needed.

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