One of the first shipping container homes, wasn’t actually the size of a shipping container. It was enormous and comprised of about 20 shipping containers cut and stacked in a unique fashion in an inner city. The reasoning behind it was seen by the Architect as the best method of cladding a large home without superficial add-ons. The project used the shipping containers as a method of finishing the internal and external surfaces of the home in the industrial surfaces preferred by the owner.
From here the evolution of Shipping container homes has been taken in some extreme directions. Most commonly preferred is stacking and over lapping the containers to form the best layout for a given home design. In reference to stacking the most common is a triple stack which has two containers side by side with a gap in the middle. The third of the containers is stacked above the two to create the greatest volumetric space per m2 for three containers. Overlapping containers also has several preferred layouts including two containers side by side and three layouts in a U shape.
In more recent trends the shipping containers have evolved from stacking and over lapping into single foldable shipping containers. This method is where shipping containers have been modified to extend and expand beyond the shippable size of the container. For instance a 20ft shipping container extends beyond the external footprint of the standard shipping size by simply opening the end doors and enclosing the space. Other folding forms are becoming more mainstream as well and have some extremely impressive footprints when expanded to its final form.
So what are the best parts of the shipping container homes. Well, its amazing the expressive things you can do within these three categories.
Large scale stacking for industrial scale homes.
Stacking or overlapping into modern homes.
Folding extendable modern homes.
Lets not forget the added bonus shipping container homes have over all other forms of home design and construction. First you can pre-order, pre-purchase, pre-plan, pre-made and pre-pay the final home before its even left the design sketch table. As an Professional Architect its been fascinating to watch the evolution of the space and I for one encourage all forms of Architecture, even the ones not considered by mainstream Architects. If your looking for something unique in terms of a shipping container homes, please check out my store regarding pre-plans, pre-made shipping container homes.
This is a topic that is close to my heart… Take care! Exactly where are your contact details though?