Shower like an astronaut

That’s the idea that got Swedish industrial designer Mehrdad Mahdjoubi thinking about how much water home showers waste – and how much energy we use heating that water. How would you solve those problems if you really were stuck in a space station?

His answer is a revolutionary shower design that rapidly filters water from the plughole up to drinking water standard and pumps it back into the showerhead straight away. It saves huge amounts of water – and because the water is recycled so quickly, it remains warm and needs very little power to get it hot again.

That adds up to serious savings – more than $1600 per year off your power bill, according to Mahdjoubi’s research – and he believes the technology could also help purify water in countries where drinking supplies are contaminated.

How it handles the bird’s nest of hair certain people manage to collect around the plughole remains to be seen – but the showers have stood up well to tests at Swedish public baths over the last northern summer, so look sure to take off... perhaps even literally, if the space industry takes note.