The Cellophane House
I just got back from the Museum of Modern Art's - Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling. They are having their member's preview today and the show opens on Sun. July 20th. The exhibition features five contemporary prefabricated houses constructed in the outdoor space to the west of the main Museum building, continuing MoMA's rich history of presenting full-scale architectural projects. Five individuals and architecture firms have been given the opportunity to deploy both commercially viable domestic creations and entirely new, speculative prototypes. Also in the exhibit on the 6th floor of the main building is what I found to be the more interesting part of the show. It is a concise history of prefabricated housing since its origins in 1833. As always the museum had some fascinating original art, sketches and plans by the likes of Frank LLoyd Wright, Marcel Breuer, and even Thomas Edison, who had developed and built prefabricated concrete houses. There are also some very interesting films and archival footage on Prefabrication. Whether you like these architects and the concept of Pre-Fab or not, the show is worth visiting. For me it was a really cool way to spend a hot day with my son.
more after the jump...
On the outdoor lot there were 5 model homes; none of them seriously addressed the idea of building sustainably, however that wasn't really the aim of the show.
The Cellophane House by Kieran Timberlake Associates LLP comes in close as they use plenty of Photo Voltaic panels and have PV Cells incorporated into their "walls/windows" and are entirely off the grid.
I won't go into the particulars of each house but instead go to the show or the site. You'll get a much better description than anything I can say.
Micro Compact Home - Richard Horden, Horden Cherry Lee architects
SYSTEM3 house
SYSTEM3 house - Oskar Leo Kaufmann / Albert Rüf
BURST*008 house - SYSTEMarchitects
Housing for New Orleans - Make It Right & Lawrence Sass - M.I.T.
Though it may not be concerned with sustainability per se, prefab housing is generally concerned with efficiency, which is in reality a central concern of sustainability. We (www.ledwaves.com) provided the BURST*008 house with LED lighting, which 10 times more efficient and longer-lasting than other technologies. It also contains no toxic materials, like mercury in fluorescents.
Posted by: Mical | 2008.07.23 at 02:03 PM