Prefabrication cannot be ignored, for it challenges the most traditional values of architecture. Architects may have neglected this area of practical construction, but they have much to learn from pattern-book houses, modular structures, Portakabins and mobile homes.The Prefabricated Home examines how the relationship between architecture and industrialized building has now become an urgent issue for architects.Colin Davies traces the history of prefabricated buildings from small-scale ‘prefabs’ to the precast concrete mass housing of the 1960s to the present-day revival of interest in ‘volumetric’ modular buildings, and assesses their architectural implications. He looks at what is happening today in factories and on building sites worldwide, and contrasts the aesthetic concerns of architects with the economic ones of industrialized building manufacturers. He argues that the involvement of architects in industrialized building can produce an exciting new type of architecture that is humane, liberating and environmentally friendly.The Prefabricated Home is a revealing and instructive book that will appeal to anyone interested in architecture and concerned with the future of housing.
