April 26, 2004

	RETRO MODERNISM A look at the allure of America's favorite era, the 1950s
	IKEA MILESTONES Giving the world access to great home design
	TRAVEL STYLES Here's what stylish globe trotters can't live without
	ABSOLUTELY PREFAB A new generation of architects is making prefab fun

Younger architects know they have to fight a stigma attached to the whole idea of factory-made housing. "With a lot of people, when you say 'prefab,' they think of mobile homes," says Rocio Romero, an architect based in Perryville, Mo. "And the prefab homes of 30 years ago were made of cheaper materials. They weren't design oriented. They were reminiscent of trailer homes." Romero (rocioromero.com) has just begun to produce the LV House kit. With its generous windows and clean, simple lines, the LV House is reminiscent of Philip Johnson's famous Glass House in New Canaan, Conn. Adapted from an inexpensive second home that Romero designed for her parents in Laguna Verde, Chile, the kit produces a rectangular one-story dwelling with two bedrooms and two baths. Price: $29,195.

Even when you add the cost of shipping—about $3,000—a building lot and contractor assembly, the final figure for an LV House would be well below the $337,000 median price for new homes in the U.S., though at 1,150 sq. ft. it's also just over half the median size of a new American home. Prefab houses can be cheaper because plumbing and wiring are laid in at the factory, which eliminates the services of plumbers and electricians on-site. Because prefabs take less time to assemble on-site than conventional houses, there are also fewer weather delays and contractor cost overruns.

Jennifer Siegal of the Office of Mobile Design (designmobile.com), a firm based in Venice, Calif., is preparing to market something she calls the Swellhouse. "It starts with a steel-framed module that's 13 ft. by 13 ft. and 26 ft. high," she says. "You're able to configure these modules like a Lego system to change the number of rooms or the amount of open space the client wants." Her hope right now is that the Swellhouse designs will build for about $200 per sq. ft. But as factory systems for mass-producing house parts improve, she expects costs to come down in all kinds of prefab production. And that could mean a new world of truly affordable dwellings. "If we can come down to the range of $60 a sq. ft.," she says, "we can change the whole face of housing."

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