loov-e-ton

August 31, 2005 12:19 AM

Homes from Snøhetta. Løvetann houses are made from modules with built-in standards such as wireless networking, kitchen and bathroom appliances, and home entertainment systems. A small step up from this.
posted by tellurian (22 comments total)

simplistic building systems like this are fundamentally incapable of producing a living environment
posted by paradise at 2:43 AM on August 31, 2005

simplistic observations without any cited rationale are incapable of making effective points
posted by Mayor Curley at 3:31 AM on August 31, 2005

Thanks, Mayor. You just proved that sometimes a simplistic answer is exactly appropriate. (But then, you have a nack for that [g/].)

FWIW, when I was a kid, I thought stuff like this was the coolest thing since sliced bread. And I would have been all over the shipping container stuff. As for a "living environment" -- those are made by living in an environment, not by following aesthetic rules. For a substantial number of people, thatched roofs and wattle-and-daub walls constitute a "living environment." (Damn. I'm messing with the Mayor's simplicity.)
posted by lodurr at 4:34 AM on August 31, 2005

It looks like a cool idea, but the website doesn't seem to show much in Firefox on Windows 2000. I would expect this thing to be all open source and shit.
posted by OmieWise at 5:22 AM on August 31, 2005

The Mayor is wise as usual. Someone in the trade once told me that at least here in the UK, house builders are far, far behind commercial builders in their use of the latest technology, thinking and project management techniques. Apparently this is one of the many contributors to our ridiculous, socially destructive house prices. Is this true/fair comment?
posted by The Salaryman at 5:42 AM on August 31, 2005

I really like the idea of affordable housing.
Yeah, OmieWise - It's a shit website but they only just launched earlier this month and definitely need some fine tuning - what's with the Flash, I couldn't get it make sense in any browser (also, how can you launch and not have prices)?
paradise - are you saying that building has to be done by artisans to make it liveable?
I'm also wondering how they will deal with the multitude of different building codes and approvals they will encounter.
posted by tellurian at 5:43 AM on August 31, 2005

The name reminds me of an earlier experiment in housing - Levittown in New York and Pennsylvania.

It seems that Snøhetta is "currently designing the Cultural Center for the new World Trade Center building in New York." [Link]
posted by PY at 5:49 AM on August 31, 2005

Yeah there doesn't seem to be much content on the site now, some of the images don't show up at all, and it doesn't say anything about price... which I think is one of the main things you'd want to know about a house like that. (Something tells me this one is not among the least expensive ones.)

I like the idea a lot. You'd really need a nice location to put it though. That's not going to be cheap either.
posted by funambulist at 5:50 AM on August 31, 2005

Does it come with an allen wrench and hundreds of little wooden dowels?

Seriously though, I'm waiting for the modern modular home to take off here in the States. There's a movement afoot, but it seems limited to warm climates and is still somewhat cost-prohibitive. There are plenty of modular manufacturers around, they just need to be convinced it's worth the investment to re-tool for more modern designs.
posted by schoolgirl report at 5:53 AM on August 31, 2005

From schoolgirl report's link...a directory of the prefab housing products that are currently in production in North America.
posted by jaronson at 6:01 AM on August 31, 2005

(also, how can you launch and not have prices)?

It's a commonly accepted practice in sales and marketing: Make them ask for the price. It's supposed to function as a sales qualifier combined with investment -- if you get them to call you, they have a personal investment, they chosen to engage.

The reasoning is probably accurate, for some personality types. For others (like mine) it's laughably wrong: Don't show me a price, and I pass on by. I think the kind of people it works for might be the same kind of people who think it's a great way to do marketing.
posted by lodurr at 6:26 AM on August 31, 2005

Great link schoolgirl report - I ♥ the weeHouse, but not sure about the name. All of these pre-fab buildings seem to be set though.
The beauty of Løvetann is the expansion [LEGO], thanks PY.
posted by tellurian at 7:15 AM on August 31, 2005

I think that modern design pre-fab homes are a cool idea. The problem comes with manufacture -- the prices per square foot I've seen put them close to the prices of conventinally built homes.

On the other hand, conventinally designed pre-fabs (ranch, colonials, capes, etc) tend to cost much less than stick built homes. It seems to me it doesn't matter much what the design is, the cost of manufacture should remain fairly constant. Today, a traditional pre-fab factory can produce some pretty custom layouts of their standard models without much of a cost differential.

And so it goes that as long as the specifications of the "box" stay consistant, it shouldn't make a difference if it's of a traditional or modern design.

I suspect the price differential has more to do with who the target market is.
posted by SteveInMaine at 11:55 AM on August 31, 2005

Along these lines checkout the FabPrefab site or there is quite a discussion on container housing here or as they are alternately referred to as IBUs in this blog.
posted by slim at 12:22 PM on August 31, 2005

Snøhetta - is it Norwegian for snot because it sure sounds like it in my head.

These are kind of neat, I'm in the modular market right now and appreciate the link and links in the thread (thanks schoolgirl report!). But they're kind of overly cartoonish for me and there's just not much information on the site to go on.
posted by fenriq at 1:16 PM on August 31, 2005

my apologies for making the first comment in the thread and then being unexpectedly taken away from the computer and the conversation for the rest of the day

may i belatedly cite (pdf) christopher alexander's "the nature of order"

his work shows that the wholeness we feel in response to the harmony of great architecture or any other part of nature is objective and can be used to make judgements about relative value. the geometry of those parts of the built environment which display the greatest wholeness arose over time as the result of a stepwise unfolding of space exactly in the way an embryo grows from an egg. therefore mechanistic conceptions of order can simply never produce living structure
posted by paradise at 2:20 PM on August 31, 2005

Snøhetta - is it Norwegian for snot because it sure sounds like it in my head.

Snøhetta ("Snow cap") is a mountain in central Norway, 2286 metres over mean sea level.

Løvetann ("Lion tooth") is a yellow flower, seen everywhere in Scandinavia during spring/summer.

/scandinavian language geek-out
posted by spazzm at 6:10 PM on August 31, 2005

The Norwegian (and Danish) letter "ø" (spelled "ö" in Sweden) is pronounced like the "u" in "puck" or the "e" in "nerd".

I'll shut up now.
posted by spazzm at 6:35 PM on August 31, 2005

Paradise, there seems to be some sort of contradiction here:

paradise : "simplistic building systems like this are fundamentally incapable of producing a living environment"

paradise : "his work shows that the wholeness we feel in response to the harmony of great architecture or any other part of nature is objective and can be used to make judgements about relative value."

The obective wholeness I feel in response to the harmony of great architecture increases with the simplisticness of the building system. The more simplistic, the more wholeness I feel. Since this is objective, and not subjective, I'm afraid it roundly disproves the initial argument.
posted by Bugbread at 7:09 PM on August 31, 2005

Snøhetta is an amazingly talented group of architects. Can't wait to see this put into action.
posted by flippant at 2:53 AM on September 1, 2005

Why buy a modular home? What are the advantages and disadvantages?
posted by pracowity at 4:01 AM on September 1, 2005

I'm no expert, but I think some of the advantages are: 1) faster build times, because it's mostly done in a factory designed for such purposes, 2) less local environmental impact due to construction, 3) (possible) customizability by combining modules, 4) theoretically cheaper prices because all the factory does is make houses (cheaper if the volumes are high enough).

Disadvantages: 1) fewer choices in design, 2) currently more expensive, 3) you have to, you know, pay for shipping for your house.
posted by crawl at 2:08 PM on September 1, 2005