A total of five entries are to receive a €10,000 award in the Rebuilding Ireland Homes for Smart Ageing Universal Design Challenge.

The five commended entrants will now enter the final round and are in with a chance of receiving a further €50,000.

The commended ideas announced are:

• Cairdeas, a platform for lifetime communities in the Irish town.

• Multi-Generational Homes, a design concept that would allow families to live within their community over many generations.

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• IRU.M.M, an Integrated Rooms Universal Mobile Modular product.

• The Abhaile Project, which develops an innovative new model for older homeowners to reconfigure their family-sized homes; and

• UrbanAge, tackling Housing/Urbanism Synergies for Smart Ageing.

Damien English T.D., Minister for Housing and Urban Renewal, said: "With over sixty high quality entries received from across Ireland and abroad, the five commended entrants superbly demonstrated the potential to create homes suitable for lifetime living and to create economic and social benefits for the community at large. The ideas were spread broadly across three distinct areas; smart technologies in housing for older people, adaptation of existing homes to meet the needs of older people and life-time communities."

(CD/LM)