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The men erected two prefabricated huts, pine kitsets brought from Norway.

A wooden frame covered with seal skins created a sheltered walkway between them and a lean-to for storage. Cables were slung over the roofs and secured to ships’ anchors buried in the ground to hold the huts steady in the wind.

Each hut was about 25 square metres, roughly the size of two of today’s tiny houses. One was used for stores, the other was living accommodation.

In the living hut, bunks lined two walls. Wool, fur and papier mâché were used for insulation and the small window was double glazed.

The bunks were designed so that they could be closed with sliding panels about which Borchgrevink wrote: “The bunks were closed after the plan followed by the sailors on board whaling vessels, with a special opening, leaving yourself in an enclosure which can hold its own with our modern coffin; and, like this, it is private.”

In the end, only the bunks occupied by the Sami were constructed in this manner, the remaining men being content with curtains. The English surveyor and magnetician, William Colbeck, isolated himself from Borchgrevink and Fougner by vertically attaching a mattress to his bunk.