Unveiling the urban nest at urban matters, shanghai, 2017.

The MINI brand is committed to applying its reputation for design innovation beyond the production of iconic cars. It further addresses imaginative and creative solutions to a whole range of contemporary urban challenges.

And so, with the aim of showcasing the latest in its range of low-personal-footprint concept dwellings, MINI LIVING will be premiering its Urban Nest at Urban Matters Shanghai. It takes place in the city from 27 October to 7 November. The event – which is the first time ever that all of MINI’s five brand topics (Automotive, LIVING, FASHION, A/D/O and URBAN-X) exhibit in one place – forms a key part of the wider “Urban Matters by MINI” initiative which was set up by MINI China earlier this year.

The Urban Nest is a framework that offers a collage of inspiring ideas about the future of urban living. It represents a series of key questions concerning how to create brighter, happier and more sustainable environments for the future inhabitants of the world’s fastest-growing cities. Can a house be thought as a flexible and transformative structure? Something in a constant change that can be easily configured and reconfigured due to changing urban spatial conditions and needs of its inhabitants? How can we turn buildings into active contributors for the improvement of urban life? These are the questions MINI LIVING answers with the Urban Nest installation for Urban Matters Shanghai in collaboration with Penda Architects from Beijing.

The Urban Nest exists as a “spatial framework” for radical future living concepts aimed at young professionals and independent creatives seeking to live and work within cities in which housing demand far outstrips supply. An issue which is particularly pertinent within a country that is currently undergoing urban expansion on an unprecedented scale.

Based on a 3 x 3m module the Urban Nest is easy to assemble and reassemble to offer endless possibilities for spatial configuration. Every module can be combined with each other or extended according to the individual requirements of the inhabitants. The modules integrate spaces to live, work and play for an inspiring collaborative life. MINI LIVING Urban Nest becomes more than just a residential building - given its open and flexible character it invites the public in and becomes an urban micro neighborhood that beats at the heart of the city.

MINI LIVING proposes future living solutions that are sympathetic to their immediate surroundings but which bring something radically new to the mix. Integrating nature that provides benefits like cooling the microclimate and producing food for the inhabitants and the neighborhood the house becomes an incubator for a brighter future of the places we love most – our cities. Inspired by the rich history of effective use of space in Shanghai dense traditional neighborhoods, MINI LIVING Urban Nest connects the past with the future by the creative use of space.