It's always nice to hear how good companies are helping the world.* I've just learned about one to keep an eye on: Containers to Clinics. C2C is a start-up non-profit that's retrofitting shipping containers for use as health clinics that cater to women and children's needs in the developing world. Their prototype container clinic is currently under construction with Stack Design Build in Rhode Island and should be complete in mid-November.
Today at West Coast Green 2009, Green Horizon showcased their new SFH40 on-demand housing, and it's an impressive unit. Designed to be a self-sustaining home for a family of four, it can be shipped anywhere in the world in a standard shipping container and set up in less than two hours by unskilled people. Each unit has two bedrooms with built in furniture, a bathroom, and a kitchen area. But it's also designed to be a self-sustaining shelter in the aftermath of a disaster when infrastructure may be damaged, so it includes solar panels and batteries, a bio-diesel generator as backup, and water purification equipment. Units can be interconnected to share power and water.
Earlier this year, the OC Register highlighted one company's efforts to transform unused warehouse space in Santa Ana, California. Orange County based Marketing Via Postal Group, Inc. needed offices for their new warehouse and decided to reuse 10 twenty-foot shipping containers as offices and a kitchen. MVP's employees did the work and the container spaces now have porthole windows, office furniture, plants, and bathrooms/sinks.
Some of you may be tired of container homes, but this one, the Cordell House, is too interesting not to talk about. Designed by Christopher Robertson and developed by Numen Development, L.P., it's a 1,858 square-foot pad with three bedrooms and three bathrooms. And in addition to being built with a number of green elements (described below), the developer was able to keep construction waste to a minimum with ten contractor trash bags total.
Update 10/2/2009: Check out the SFH40 Premiere at WCG 2009!
Last year, West Coast Green had an awesome shipping container home exhibit, and it appears that this year will bring something similar. Yet a little different. As confirmed by Michelle Kaufmann (who will be speaking on Friday of WCG), start up Green Horizon will exhibit their green emergency / container housing unit at the Fort Mason Center in San Francisco, California. The design of the Green Horizon unit is pretty incredible -- it knocks the socks off of FEMA trailers -- so you’re going to want to see this in person.*
There's something about the simple design of this small container home that I really like. It was mentioned on A Site-Specific Experiment, which is run by Chutayaves Sinthuphan out of Bangkok, Thailand. The one-bedroom, one bathroom home was built using two, 20-foot containers with cutouts for windows and doors. There's a prefab bathroom inside and the interior is insulated with a recycled content material.
In April 2009, this bold vacation cabin received a 2009 Residential Architect Design Award in the custom home under 3,500 square feet category. The NY Times may have noticed, because Kate Murphy also published a feature article about the home last week. Referred to as Camp Cinco, this low-tech retreat was designed by Mark T. Wellen of Rhotenberry Wellen Architects for owner Roger Black and constructed by placing five shipping containers on hand-dug piers. The design is simple and striking.
Using seven recycled shipping containers, architect Bernard Morin and wife Joyce Labelle built this contemporary residence in St. Adele, Quebec. The home is the first of many to come for their new company, Maison Idekit, which will help homeowners turn containers into architecturally unique, and inexpensive, homes. The company has two more residential projects set to break ground in the next couple months using a total of twelve container modules.
When we first mentioned Logical Homes in August 2007, I guess we didn't realize how long it would be until the company actually launched. But I think the wait has been worth it. Logical Homes is officially out of pre-launch and just published details of their first three home designs. The company is run by a whole list of folks, but the most notable is probably their Creative Director and COO, Peter DeMaria. He's a high profile expert in container architecture -- don't miss this video of him talking about container homes. Let's check out what Logical Homes just introduced:
It looks like Group 41 has been hard at work on a few designs for a multifamily project in Salt Lake County built entirely from containers. Below you'll see both proposals, the Curve Scheme and the Red Container Scheme, but the general idea is to create about 200 units of market-rate housing along the rail transportation corridor. Group 41's Container Nation developed the two proposals to take advantage of different approaches to the stacking and build out of the containers. In all, probably 1000 containers would be used -- but this is preliminary conceptual phase with preliminary local planning approvals expected in mid-2009 or so ...
home about us contact us good links green books green jobs
rss feed
daily emails
twitter
facebook
technorati
delicious
