Alittle red house on the inhospitable, remote and colourless moon!
As you read this, Swedish artist Mikael Genberg’s 25-year dream is racing through the vastness of space, towards the lunar surface. On January 15, ispace, a Tokyo-based lunar exploration company, launched its second lunar mission aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, carrying Genberg’s toy-sized house as payload.
Genberg’s ‘Moonhouse’ is inspired by classic Swedish red cottages that have dotted the Nordic countryside for centuries. The 61-year-old artist said his Moonhouse resembles the house an average Swedish child would draw when asked to sketch one. “I was raised in a little red house. I live in one,” he said, adding that he created the work with eight-year-olds—and those who still carry the curiosity and wonder of an eight-year-old—in mind.
ispace is targeting a landing at Mare Frigoris (Sea of Cold), located far north of the moon’s earth-facing side. The mission will use the lander Resilience and the rover Tenacious for the four-month journey through space before touchdown.
“I started the Moonhouse project in 1999 after reading an article in a Swedish newspaper that announced, ‘Now Sweden goes to the moon’,” recalled Genberg. “The piece highlighted how the Swedish space company had been given the prestigious honour of building Europe’s first lunar probe.”
It took Genberg two years to approach the Swedish Space Agency, and in all that time, the thought that he might never accomplish his idea would gnaw at him. “I simply called them and said, “Hi, my name is Mikael Genberg. I’ve seen that you’re going to the moon, and I’d like to put a red house on the moon. Is there any chance I could join you?’ There was complete silence on the other end. Eventually, they replied with something like, ‘No, not today,’ and that was the end of it—for the moment,” he recalled.
Genberg then reached out to a few friends. “Even if they weren’t particularly influential, everyone knows someone who knows someone. So, we started compiling a list of people who might find the idea interesting and figuring out how to contact them,” he said. “When we shared the concept of putting a house on the moon, the reactions were mixed. Some thought it was absurd and dismissed it outright. But to our surprise, quite a few influential people found the idea intriguing. They saw potential in it—not just as a space project but as something deeply symbolic. Space exploration is often cold and impersonal, filled with satellites and steel, nothing painted or humanised. This little red house added an entirely new dimension.”
Reaching for the moon: Mikael Genberg’s artistic impression of the little red house on the moon on canvas.
Before long, there occurred a growing group of supporters in Sweden and internationally for the red house. Eventually, Genberg and team were invited to NASA to present the idea. “The project gained momentum, and we were on a steady upward curve—until 2008-2009, when the global financial crisis hit and [once again] the project spiralled downward,” said Genberg.
Meanwhile, Genberg’s Moonhouse travelled across the earth—from the Great Wall of China to underwater depths. In 2009, Sweden’s first astronaut, Christer Fuglesang, took a paper version of the red house to the International Space Station.
Between 2012 and 2014, the project once again gathered some momentum, but not enough for it to become a reality. Then Emil Vinterhav, head of the Moonhouse technical team, got in touch with ispace, the Japanese lunar exploration company. “They told us, ‘Yes, you can come along. We can attach the house to the front of the rover, but it can only be this big [read small]’,” recalled Genberg.
The Moonhouse mounted on the ispace lunar rover Tenacious.
Originally, Genberg envisioned a much larger house. “That was my mistake—I thought the accomplishment lay in creating a full-sized house. But when we shifted our focus to this smaller version, I realised it had a much stronger poetic quality,” he said, adding that looking back at earth can be a powerful source of inspiration. “If we were to build a house on the moon, it could shift our perspective—allowing us to see our planet from a distance and reflect on our place in the universe. In many ways, the world has never needed such a perspective more than it does now. Humanity needs to take a step back and truly see where we stand—just a tiny grain of sand in an immense cosmos. This is our home, and it is all we have.”
At 12cm long, 8cm wide and 10cm tall, the Moonhouse may look tiny, but engineers worked for more than two years to secure its place in the lunar lander’s cargo hold and to ensure that it could withstand attachment to the front of a rover and survive the journey to space. The 3D-printed aluminium house also underwent rigorous shock and vibration tests to meet the demanding requirements of space travel. “One of our engineers worked with a different approach—a 3D-printed plastic model. But that turned out to be far too heavy to be practical. Ultimately, aluminium was the right choice,” said Genberg.
Then came the question of painting the house red. “I initially assumed we could just use regular artist’s paint. But we soon discovered that colour is almost non-existent in space. The only colours used were gold (for heat protection), silver, black and white,” he said. “Since no commercial space-grade paint existed, we had to develop our own. Now we are the only company in the world that can sell space-grade paint.”
Genberg quipped that some day when humans make colonies on the moon and build colourful houses, he can sell the paint. “The challenge with the paint was that it couldn’t release any gases. All paints emit some level of outgassing, and if particles were to escape, they could settle on camera lenses or interfere with electronics, potentially causing serious damage,” he explained. “To ensure safety, we had to conduct rigorous testing. The paint itself is almost like ceramic—it undergoes a controlled heating and cooling process in an oven, making it highly durable. The entire process has been quite experimental.” And, about 70 people donated 7 million to 10 million Swedish kronor to put the red house on the moon.
Genberg, a serial entrepreneur and avid fan of sci-fi movies and illustration, admitted that nothing could have prepared him for the overwhelming emotion he felt while witnessing his Moonhouse launch into space. “Now, every time I look up at the sky, I can’t help but think about it. Somewhere out there, in the vastness of space, there’s a moon lander. And on that lander sits a small red house,” he said.
You cannot really fault him for constantly thinking about it—for, a piece of his own heart is en route to the moon.