How was the NEST developed?
The idea for the NEST was first used in a set of cartooned construction drawings for a 40 sq ft self-erecting shelter for 6 people in a NSF proposal more than 30 years ago. It was not funded and would have been a disaster to manufacture, but it led to further research into three dimensional construction drawings, animations, and building information models. The research explored variations on tiny houses, including a self-contained home called Jeremiah, a research building called the Gravity House, and the Erectable Hypergraphic Trainer, once used to teach environmental technologies. Most of the ideas for the NEST come from several years of graduate school (PhD) research into squatter homes and informal dwellings in the so-called third world. This work included graphic animations and three dimensional modeling of design and construction techniques used in squatter housing along the US-Mexican border, agricultural squatters in Baja California, and land invasions in Honduras, Nicaragua,
