Offsite Architecture

"Quale and Smith have brokered for us a glimpse into the proverbial fray of practicing prefabrication. They've assembled a multi-national group of current thinkers, designers, and researchers who offer individual testaments on its constitution. The result is a productive frisson between theory, history, and case studies, each tailored to regimes of philosophy, policy, and place. It is no surprise that this grouping neatly manages to dodge a singular definition, offering instead many approaches to this kind of construction. Offsite Architecture will satisfy the architect who intuits that prefabrication is not entirely known, nor is its future entirely certain, but that to employ it one must overcome the hype." - Billie Faircloth, Partner, KieranTimberlake

Ryan E. Smith is an Associate Professor of Architecture at the University of Utah, USA. He has investigated offsite design and construction for nearly a decade through industry-applied research. He is author of Prefab Architecture (Wiley, 2010) and Building Systems (Routledge, 2012). He is past Chair of the Board of Directors of the National Institute of Building Sciences Off-Site Construction Council. He is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Offsite Construction at Edinburgh Napier University in the UK. John D. Quale is Director and Professor of Architecture at the University of New Mexico School of Architecture and Planning, USA. His expertise is in sustainable design, affordable housing, prefabrication, the environmental impact of construction, and collaborative and integrated design processes. He is the author of Sustainable, Affordable, Prefab: The ecoMOD Project (UVA Press, 2012) and Trojan Goat: A Self-Sufficient House (UVA Press, 2002), about his leadership of the 2002 UVA Solar Decathlon Team in a national design/build house competition sponsored by the US Department of Energy.

Foreword Chris Sharples Introduction Ryan E. Smith and John Quale Part 1: Offsite Theory 1. Industrialized Building System Categorization Roger-Bruno Richard 2. System Structures: Theory of Industrialized Architecture Kasper Sanchez Vibaek 3. Constructing Dialogues: On Architectural Potentials of Montage Charlotte Bundgaard 4. Industrial Relevancy Today: Suggestions for Offsite Construction Industry's Future Trends Marjorie P. Callahan 5. Mapping the Modular Industry Ivan Rupnik 6. Prefabricated Housing in Architectural Culture Mathew Aitchison and John Macarthur Part 2: Offsite Practices 7. Offsite Construction Industry Meta-Analysis: Industry Survey Results Talbot Rice and Ryan E. Smith 8. Permanent Modular Construction: Construction Performance Ryan E. Smith and Talbot Rice 9. Off-site Construction in Education: a survey of prefabrication in design and construction academics Ryan E. Smith, Jon Elliott, and Kevin Grosskopf 10. Onsite vs. Offsite: Comparing Environmental Impacts John Quale 11. High Performance Affordable Modular Homes: A University and Modular Industry Collaboration John Quale 12. A Case Study of Multi-Trade Near-Site Factory Assembly Kihong Ku and Paul Broadstone 13. Prefabricated Housing In Japan Dana Buntrock 14. Offsite Construction in Sweden: from Technology to Integrated Process Helena Lideloew 15. A Scottish Perspective on Timber Offsite Construction Robert Hairstans and Fausto Sanna List of Illustration Credits Glossary of Terms Index