Tsunami intervention has been an extraordinary and unprecedented relief and recovery operation. This article underlines the complexities posed by shelter and housing intervention in post-tsunami Sri Lanka, revealing a pragmatic, reductionist approach to shelter and housing reconstruction in a contested and fragmented environment. Competition, housing anxiety and buffer zone implementation have resulted in compulsory villagisation inland, stirring feelings of discrimination and tension, and becoming major obstacles to equitable rebuilding of houses and livelihoods. A new tsunami geography has been imposed on an already vulnerable conflict-based geography, in which shelter has been conceived as a mono-dimensional artefact. An analysis of the process and outcomes of temporary and permanent post-tsunami housing programmes yields information about the extent to which shelter policies and programmes serve not only physical needs but 'higher order' objectives for a comprehensive and sustainable recovery plan.