Jonathan Morrison
Prefab homes: the house that was built in a day (or two)
Prefabricated houses aren’t what they used to be. Now they’re eco-friendly, gorgeous to look at and can be built anywhere from a mountaintop to a forest glade
Imagine you could choose a home as you would an expensive car. Instead of clicking through a list of paint jobs and wheels, you would select a floorplan, specify materials, pick a colour palette and decide what glazing you would like, then robots would assemble your dream home. Extremely accurate robots who would not make mistakes, stop for tea breaks, insert sockets with a sledgehammer or smear mud across the floor. The finished homes could be delivered to any location.
Well, that day will soon be upon us. In the past couple of years there has been a resurgence of interest in prefabricated houses worldwide. In Japan nearly a third of new homes, about 120,000 a year, are assembled in factories rather than on site (mainly by big car manufacturers such as Toyota). In Sweden 85 per cent of residential properties are now built using some form of industrial production. And in the US technology companies such as Amazon and Google have begun to invest in modular construction, partly due to the need to house workers in areas with dizzying property prices, such as San Francisco, and partly because they think housebuilding is ready for a revolution. Bent Flyvbjerg, a professor of major programme management at Oxford University’s Saïd Business School, says: “They’ve looked at what builders do on a daily basis and have concluded it’s an industry that’s ripe for the taking.”
In the UK prefabs have not had positive connotations, thanks to the small, shed-like constructions that were built in the aftermath of the Second World War to address an acute shortage of housing. That’s about to change. Not only because, thanks to the pandemic, there’s been a rising demand for outdoor space and a growing appetite for rural living, but also because they are faster, more sustainable and less stressful to construct. With build times reduced from about five months to under two weeks, no delays imposed by inclement weather and no need to source skilled craftsmen, they are ideally suited to ambitious house-hunters who want ultra-modern homes with unusual addresses.
Around the world extraordinary examples are springing up, from the tops of mountains to the sides of lakes. The Zufferey House in Switzerland, designed by Nunatak Sàrl Architectes, for instance, sits among vineyards and resembles a block of stone, angled to reflect the shapes of distant mountain peaks. The elegant Vipp Shelter, a prefab hotel in Sweden that has floor-to-ceiling sliding windows and Scandi interiors, shows the potential of compact designs; it occupies a tiny space at the heart of a woodland. And if you don’t have a scrap of wilderness on which to build? No problem. The LilliHaus by the Brazilian company SysHaus is a cabin that can be assembled in two days and plonked on a lake or river.
Vipp Shelter, Sweden: a prefab hotel in the forest that has floor-to-ceiling windows to bring nature closer (MARK SEELEN)
For those wanting a house almost immediately, there are off-the-peg models available to buy on Amazon, and the European market leaders WeberHaus (weberhaus.co.uk) and Huf Haus (huf-haus.com) can ship and erect contemporary glass and steel dwellings in as little as a week. In the UK there are already several British firms offering stylish smaller homes, usually somewhat Scandinavian in terms of looks and materials. Koto (kotodesign.co.uk) has a particularly eye-catching range designed by chartered architects, while the Wee House (theweehousecompany.co.uk) provides customisable wooden cottages that would certainly not look out of place in a Highland glen.
Their timber designs mean that not only do these creations blend into their rugged settings, but they also have strong green credentials. With intelligent planning, wooden prefab projects can end up carbon neutral because the trees used to construct them absorb carbon as they grow. Then there are the advantages conferred by precision engineering: airtight sealing means they are well insulated and easy to heat, while the waste of materials is minimal. Many incorporate triple glazing, solar panels or wind turbines, and ground-source heat pumps. In fact, London’s first “Passivhaus” – a stringent international standard for energy efficiency – is a prefab larch-clad mews house in Camden by Bere Architects that requires just 10 per cent of the heating of an average British property and that also harvests rainwater for irrigation, washing and even drinking.
Environmentally friendly doesn’t have to mean dull and worthy. One of the most stunning domestic designs of recent years is the Grid House in the rainforest near Sao Paulo in Brazil. Raised on wooden pillars and carpeted with a green roof, it is described by its architect, FGMF, as an “inhabitable garden” that blends into the landscape without disturbing it. Because of its grid layout, further rooms can be added at any time, which gives the modern prefab another advantage over traditional residences. This means that the house can be adapted as life changes, for instance to reconfigure the flow of spaces as one grows old or to switch to working from home.
Casa Algarrobo, Chile: the living and dining areas are flooded with light thanks to an abundance of glass (SEBASTIÁN AEDO)
Casa Algarrobo, by GA Estudio in Chile, is another creative example of a multigenerational home. Its wood-framed modules can be moved or increased in number according to the needs of the occupants, offering a common central outdoor area with private spaces for all three age groups who live there while conceding nothing on aesthetic grounds.
And that brings us to an important point: although early prefabs, in Britain at least, resembled air-raid shelters or brick outhouses, the most recent, architect-designed homes are as easy on the eye as they are on the environment. Take Furniture House 5 in New York, by the Japanese Pritzker prizewinner Shigeru Ban, who took an earlier design for a house by Mies van der Rohe and reinterpreted it in wood. The result – made of 144 individual units that can be lifted into place by two people at a time – is a series of stunning but utterly functional spaces that combine to create a truly sumptuous abode. Perhaps more than any other contemporaneous project, it shows just how far prefabs have come and what’s possible. And what’s possible is pretty astounding. From floating cabins and jungle-wrapped villas in South America to tiny shelters in Scandinavian glades, there’s seemingly a prefab for any location and any budget.
Furniture House 5, US: this home in New York is made up of 144 individual units
The last word should go to Avi Friedman, the author of Pre-Fab Living, a comprehensive new book. “In the past, people might have stayed away from them because there were a limited number of options,” he says. “But now people are recognising that only prefabs can give them the choice and flexibility they need.”
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