Space-Age Portable Toilet Lets You Answer Nature’s Call In Style
It isn’t the most pleasant experience having too many drinks at a festival and feeling the urge to pee. It’s the lineup of portable toilets that does it, with their cramped spaces and stench. And somehow, there’s always some shame associated with using one.
It goes without saying that, if given a choice, absolutely no one would pick a porta potty as their preferred restroom. Yet, the folks at portable pod startup Jupe might have something that will change your mind. They’ve just unveiled ‘The Portal’, a sci-fi-esque pod that will have you fulfilling your duties in the next dimension.
Departing from the usual utilitarian design, The Portal is a sharp-edged, metallic pod with mirrored walls that blend into the landscape. You can sit in it and peer at the surroundings thanks to its two-way glass facade, though a retractable screen gives you privacy to get closer to nature’s calls.
Inside, the comfort station has three times the space of a regular portable, making sure your knees don’t stick to plastic walls. Ample lighting keeps you from feeling around for toilet paper, and a ventilation system ensures your luxury experience isn’t ruined by the person before you.
Meanwhile, the interiors are deliberately stark-white to mirror a museum gallery.
Instead of looking at your phone, you can gaze upwards into the see-through ‘Sky Portal’, where views of the sky greet you.
The cutout itself is an “optical illusion,” say the designers, and it appears as a perfect circle from where you’re seated despite being an oval.
The portable toilet’s lighting and odor ventilation are powered by solar panels installed outside the cubicle.
Jupe’s CEO and lead designer Jeff Wilson tells Dwell that the geometric structure takes inspiration from Bjarke Ingels Group’s CopenHill urban recreation center and waste-to-energy hub in Denmark, as well as its Sluishuis housing project, in addition to the monolithic installations of Donald Judd.
Wilson describes that, instead of forcing users into “the lowest of human experiences,” The Portal “teleports” them “to some sort of minimalist art museum.”
If you’re wondering, yes, the restroom can even be configured with SpaceX’s Starlink service.
Prices for The Portal start from US$4,995. A nearly US$9,000 variation throws in solar panels, a 200Ah battery, an always-on fan, and a ceiling LEDs. The highest-tier cubby, priced at US$10,995, enables the conversion of poop into fertilizer compost.
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