Prefab takes a look at prefabricated housing's fascinating history and imagines its promising future by presenting a group of innovative homes and concepts from over 30 contemporary architects and designers including Shigeru Ban, Thomas Sandell, David Hertz, Greg Lynn, and KFN.
"Prefab Architecture . . . is beyond theory, and beyond most of what we think we know about pods, containers, mods, and joints. This book is more than 'Prefabrication 101.' It is the Joy of Cooking writ large for the architecture and construction industries." From the Foreword by James Timberlake, FAIA THE DEFINITIVE REFERENCE ON PREFAB ARCHITECTURE FOR ARCHITECTS AND CONSTRUCTION PROFESSIONALS Written for architects and related design and construction professionals, Prefab Architecture is a guide to off-site construction, presenting the opportunities and challenges associated with designing and building with components, panels, and modules. It presents the drawbacks of building in situ (on-site) and demonstrates why prefabrication is the smarter choice for better integration of products and processes, more efficient delivery, and realizing more value in project life cycles. In addition, Prefab Architecture provides: A selected history of prefabrication from the Industrial Revolution to current computer numerical control, and a theory of production from integrated processes to lean manufacturing Coverage on the tradeoffs of off-site fabrication including scope, schedule, and cost with the associated principles of labor, risk, and quality Up-to-date products featuring examples of prefabricated structure, enclosure, service, and nterior building systems Documentation on the constraints and execution of manufacturing, factory production, transportation, and assembly Dozens of recent examples of prefab projects by contemporary architects and fabricators including KieranTimberlake, SHoP Architects, Office dA, Michelle Kaufmann, and many others In Prefab Architecture, the fresh approaches toward creating buildings that accurately convey ature and expanded green building methodologies make this book an important voice for adopting change in a construction industry entrenched in traditions of the past.
As we stand on the cusp of a fundamental restructuring of the housing and building industries, this book provides timely insights into the promise of prefabricated housing. The idea of a more industrialised approach to house building is not a new one: since the 19thcentury, designers, inventors, engineers, builders, developers, and entrepreneurs have all been fascinated by the idea of the factory-built, modular home. But international housing affordability crises, emerging technologies, and concerns for more sustainable building practices have given a new urgency to the need to transform building construction in the 21st century.Richly illustrated and drawing on historical examples and contemporary design studies, the book takes the reader through the foundations of prefab, leading up to a discussion of contemporary problems and opportunities. It includes a broad international survey of leading companies and their products, and draws on research from an international team of experts in the field. This book suggests a future scenario for industrialised house building that will both challenge the existing industry and stimulate the public imagination.
From sash windows and ceramic tiles to barracks and warehouses, industrialized building has thrived since the nineteenth century in Europe and America. Yet architects have neglected this area of practical construction in favor of historical, theoretical, and artistic analyses, resulting in the emergence of an influential building industry with architects on the far margins. Colin Davies explores in The Prefabricated Home how the relationship between architecture and industrialized building has now become an urgent issue for architects. The Prefabricated Home outlines the methods and motives of prefabricated buildings and assesses their architectural implications. Davies traces the origins of the branded building phenomenon with examples ranging from the Dymaxion bathroom to IKEA's "Bo Klok" house. He also analyzes the use of industrialized buildings worldwide—including McDonald's drive-through restaurants and contrasts the aesthetic concerns of architects against the economic ones of industrialized building manufacturers. Ultimately, The Prefabricated Home proposes a partnership of architects and industrialized building that could potentially produce an exciting new type of humane and eco-conscious architecture.
For a number of years, modular construction – the use of prefabricated elements in architecture – has once again become a subject of lively discussion and debate. Long written off as monotonous, today’s building components are actually highly differentiated and capable of supporting and enhancing the architect’s creativity. Numerous structures work with prefabricated components; for single-family homes the figure is ninety-eight percent, and modular systems are available that meet high aesthetic standards. This book provides an overview of the various different systems and their possible uses, particularly in the areas of housing, office, and industrial buildings. It explains the processes and components of modular construction and the behavior of the various materials when this construction approach is used. The authors offer strategies for planning and designing with prefabricated systems so that the architect can use them productively. Numerous drawings explain the principles of modular construction, while built examples forge a link between those principles and the practical activity of building.
Prefabricated and Modular Architecture demystifies age-old perceptions surrounding prefabrication and modularization of buildings, offering a fresh approach to design and procurement. Experienced architect, William Hogan-O'Neill, provides a unique insight into why architectural design, manufacturing and assembly processes must coexist in parallel. In order for the architectural profession to have a meaningful existence in the future, it must examine the new opportunities that are emerging through automation and artificial intelligence from within the factory environment, as opposed to the construction site. In addition, the book explores the following topics; core elements defining prefabrication; perceptions and influences; precision, exactness and tolerances; standardization and economies of scale; panelized versus modular buildings as a design solution and, finally, common features, technical considerations and certification.
As slums were cleared all across England after the Blitz in World War II, the need for housing became pressing, and prefabrication was quickly embraced as a temporary solution. The resulting bungalows with slightly pitched roofs, pretty gardens, and all modern conveniences became home to hundreds of thousands of people around the country, including many who had not previously had the luxury of hot running water or a fridge. These squat little homes were meant to last just a decade--a mere stopgap as the country got back on its feet--but many of the prefabs are still standing today, with residents often fighting to hold on to them. Responding to growing public interest in these fast disappearing houses and the communities they fostered, this book recounts residents' first-hand experiences--from the first time they laid eyes on these "little castles" to their attempts to hold onto them beyond their designated short-term time frame. Authors consider the relative success of postwar prefab housing in the wider context of British social housing and examine clever solutions being put forward to solve the housing crisis today. Fewer and fewer prefabs remain, but you can still spot them here and there across the English landscape, sitting cozily among their big brick-built neighbors, a lesson in thoughtful design and community-building.
We have written this book as a hands-on, practical, and scalable guide to prefab. Itapplies if you are starting from ground zero, or if you are at the 3% mark and trying to get to 50%. The book is not about "benchmarking" or "best practices"; it is grounded in thereality of what other industrialized industries have passed through, which will happen in construction sooner or later. We can learn from history and the science of work (IndustrialEngineering), to move faster and with fewer mistakes, rather just comparing to the status quo of "best practices" in today's construction environment.Maximum prefab requires a culture of prefab, by understanding the true benefits of prefab which are way beyond saving "hours". Benefits include risk reduction, increasedreliability and predictability of the outcome; reduced uncertainties from the jobsite, anopportunity to train manpower in a controlled environment. Monetarily, the benefits are best quantified as composite rate savings, which reflects a better managed crew ratio and overall productivity improvement.The most valuable part of this book for the majority of our readers will be theAppendices, which is a set of sample and blank forms, and templates for your use, to start or add to your vision and mission of doing more prefab. We will be updating these forms and templates regularly, and have them available electronically on our www.agileprefab.com blog. Please contact us to join and always have access to the latest and greatest.
This congenial graphic architectural history examines the significance of the prefab bathroom in the history of prefabricated technologies in the built environment. The cultural aspects of ritual and sanitary necessities of hygiene have added to complexities in bathroom design, and driven the development of various alternative construction methods, specifically prefabrication. First introduced with Buckminister Fuller's 1936 Dymaxion Bathroom, and subsequently revisited by many architects and designers, the prefab model has expanded to "pod" and "plug-in" concepts on the building- and city-scale.