Julien Nolin has spent time designing in the Arctic, the Amazon, and Copenhagen, but it was never about climate nor latitude. It was a philosophy about the elimination of complexity, and what to leave behind in the design process. His Quebec-based prefab housing company Base Habitation, launched in March 2026, is the fullest expression of that idea to date.
The prototype, called Base Camp, went up last December on the grounds of LAO Cantons-de-l'Est, a hospitality property recently acquired by the outdoor lifestyle brand Beside. It sits where the footpaths give way to forest, revealing a cabin, but not quite a cabin, with a clean roofline and an exterior of either natural wood or stained black. For a prefab, it reads as anything but.
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