| Abstrakt: |
In a bid to catalyse the uptake of offsite manufacturing to ease its housing crisis, the Greater London Authority (GLA) has commissioned “Modernise or Die” author Mark Farmer to develop a “Manufactured Housing Design Code” that would include a catalogue of standardised building components. The GLA believes that, armed with such a code, architects would be free to design bespoke houses and apartment blocks with the certainty that a growing manufacturing base can supply standard and interoperable elements. In interviews with CRI, Farmer and project co-lead Jaimie Johnston, an architect at Bryden Wood, described how they will carry out the study this year, and why they think such a code would help offsite finally establish itself as a prevalent mode of housing delivery. The history of Japan’s now-mature offsite housing sector is reviewed to demonstrate the stimulating effect of standardisation, and three companies disrupting traditional home-building approaches in the US, Austria and the Netherlands are explored. |
