Brad Pitt's floating house

Here's a story that's got it all -- celebrity star-power, plus a plastics angle. Morphosis Architects has completed what it claims is the first floating house permitted in the United States, for Brad Pitt's Make It Right Foundation. The key to the project is a prefabricated "chassis," made from polystyrene foam coated in glass fiber-reinforced concrete, which serves as the base of the house. In the event of a flood, the base of the house acts as a raft, allowing the house to rise vertically on guide posts, securely floating up to twelve feet above the ground. The FLOAT House is designed to be flood-safe, affordable and sustainable. The house mimics the design of the traditional New Orleans "shotgun" house, and it was built specifically for that city's flood-prone Ninth Ward. The Ecorazzi.com blog posted some photos of the FLOAT house today. They're worth checking out.