Park Your House by Niki Wang

PARK YOUR HOUSE

Contents Mass-Production Spirit and Economic Rule Housing Type and Its Ownership Real Estate and Real Mass-Production Spirit Separated Ownership A New Paradigm for Housing Development RV, Pre-Fab House and Mobile Home Pre-Fabrication or Pre-Construction Precedents Plug-In City Metabolism Lesson From Mobile Home From Automobile to Mobile Home Transforming the Landscape of the Supermarket Urban Transformation Brentwood Neighborhood Program

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“THE PROBLEM OF THE HOUSE IS A PROBLEM OF THE EPOCH. THE EQUILIBRIUM OF SOCIETY TODAY DEPENDS UPON IT. ARCHITECTURE HAS FOR ITS FIRST DUTY.” - Quote from < Towards a New Architecture >, Le Corbusier, 1927

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"WE MUST CREATE THE MASS-PRODUCTION SPIRIT."

- Quote from < Towards a New Architecture >, Le Corbusier, 1927

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Mass-Production Spirit and Economic Rule

"We must create the mass-production spirit. The spirit of constructing mass-production house. The spirit of living mass-production house. The spirit of conceiving mass-production house." All of our daily life products are manufactured from factory, the "mass-production spirit" becomes the spirit of our epoch. During the post-war period, with the boom of mass-production houses in the urban and suburban area, we have produced thousands of massproduction houses. However, one distinct difference between these mass-produced houses and other mass-produced products is the price. Massproduction means everyone could consume the same product paying the same price. While for the houses, the prices differet from urban to suburban, from one neighborhood to another, even different within a relatively small district. Housing products usually may find out to be samilar in scale, material, quality even in design, while they are priced differently base on the location. While the reason for this price difference is obvious enough. However, under the current economic rules, even though the mass-production houses are over the world, we are not able to claim that we have the mass-production spirit in housing.

- Quotes from < Towards a New Architecture >, Le Corbusier, 1927

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THE VALUE OF A HOUSE IS TIED TO THE LAND UPON WHICH IT SITS

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Housing Type and Its Ownership

Real Estate and Real Mass-Production Spirit

Real Estate is "Property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals, or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this; (also) an item of real property; (more generally) buildings or housing in general. The definition of "Real Estate" legally secured the bounding relationship of the house and its land, which comes from a common sense that a building is permernently constructed on the land. The value of the land is totally determined by the location, the environment and all the ecomonic rules behind it. When constructing the mass-production houses on the land with specific value, it immediately loses its "spirit of the mass-production".

Detached House

Everything within the property line is privately owned.

Town House / Row House

Both the land the and house are Privately owned. While the Party wall is shared by the two house owners.

Apartment / Condo

Each unit is individually owned, while all the unit-owners share the ownership of the land.

Mobile Home

The ownership of the Mobile Home unit (trailer) is separate from the land.

To cooperate with the mass-production house, we need mass-production land use strategy. For large suburban developments, the developers are able to even the value of pacels within certain districts. Which results in the homogeneous suburbias, the lack of identity and connection to essential urban elements, raising many issues. We need the variety of the land value, the mixed land use strategy to create a more lively and better connected urban and suburban environment, we also need mass-production houses.

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WHY ARE LAND AND HOUSE BOUND AND SOLD TOGETHER?

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Separated Ownership

Once the ownership of house and its land are detached, the house is no longer building on its land, its "parking" on its "lot"

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Separated Ownership

House : A mass-produced moveable dwelling unit. The owner of the "house" need to rent or own a "lot" to "park" in a neighborhood.

YOU OWN THE HOUSE BUT YOU DON`T NECESSARILY OWN THE LAND

Lot: A type of real estate consisting only the land, with providing essential infrastructural facilities to the "house" unit, the person who rent or own the "lot" share the ownership of the neighborhood assets. Real Estate is "Property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals, or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this; (also) an item of real property; (more generally) buildings or housing in general. Taking "house" out of the definition of "Real Estate", the house and the land are sold and owned separately, which matchs the desire of mass-production. The house is now an industrialised product, priced by its manufacturing company, free from the value of the land upon which it sits. While the land, or the "lot", continues to be "real estate" taking all the economical resposibilities, but regardless of the "house" on top, its value and use could be much more flexible to the economical environment.

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A New Paradigm for Housing Development

A New Paradigm for Housing Development Separating the ownership of house and land would benefit the development of both. The price of the house could be tied back to the real costs of the manufacturing of the house itself, not influenced by the economical and political environment. Extracted from vocabulary of architecture, it becomes an industrial product, applying the most advanced manufacturing technology to achieve not only mass-production but also mass-customization. Only with the highly standarised and simplified mass-customization design system, could really bring customers into the design process.

Purely Pre-Fabricated House

The creation of the neighborhood on the other hand, has much more freedom and flexibility as well. Instead of invest on both housing construction and community facilities, the developer of the "House Park" only need to invest on the comminity service facilities such as shopping complex, resturants, kindergarden, parks. With these elements constructed, the house owners would bring their houses and "park" into the neighborhood.

When detached from the realm of Real Estate, the house could finally fully embrace the most advanced manufacturing technology.

Service Oriented Development

Housing development is never about the house itself. Developers should focus on constructing all the infrastructural elements that could acturally facilitate our daily lives.

Dynamic Neighborhood

The separate ownership of "lots" and houses allows for free combination of individual housing types and flexible group configurations.

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ONLY MASS-CUSTOMIZATION CAN BRING CUSTOMERS INTO DESIGN PROCESS

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FROM HOUSING ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT TO NEIGHBORHOOD ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT

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RV, Pre-Fabricated House and Mobile Home There are three existing approaches to the moveable dwelling unit on the market, RV, Pre-Fabricated House and Mobile Home. The idea of a house is manufactured from factory and placed on site is nothing new to us. In fact, as the construction technology develops, every project, regardless of scale or function, has more or less used pre-fabricated components. The difference between pre-fabricated house and mobile home is that, a mobile home is designed and manufactured for a mobile lifestyle, while a pre-fabricated house is only taking the advantage of factory manufacturing environment for low construction costs, higher energy efficiency, higher finishing quality. Once placed on site, it is a permenent structure. While a RV is basically a type of vehicle with facilities that could support the need of dwelling. There are many attempts at pre-fabricated houses, but they never entered the main stream of the housing market. The reason is simply that, what`s really important to the buyer is not the house itself, it is neighborhood, community, urban assets and infrastructures that together would makes a house successful. But for most cases, the pre-fab house projects are located in remote areas, away from urban environment.

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"EVERYTHING MUST BE BEGUN FROM THE BEGINNING"

- Quote from < Towards a New Architecture >, Le Corbusier, 1927

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Pre-Fabrication or Pre-Construction?

"This was an exceptional event in the annals of construction and required exceptional means and methods. Now, it was necessary to start from the very beginning; nothing be ready for the realization of such an immense program. The right state of mind does not exist." Although the term of "Pre-Fabrication" has been used in architectural realms for over a century, and the idea of pre-fab house has been around since 1880s, there is still a lack of clarification of to what extent is a building pre-fabricated. In the modern construction, almost every project has applied large amount of pre-fab architectural components such as window, door, plumping systems, facade cladding panels, interior dry walls, even main structural frame. In fact, there are relatively small amount of work that is actually not pre-fabricated today. How would we define the boundary of pre-fab ? When taking the manufacture process of large scale industrial products such as car, furniture or even daily products such as mobile phone, bicycle, compare to the process of these factory-built "pre-fab" buildings. It is obvious that these "pre-fab" buildings has not integrated with any advanced manufacture technologies at all. The so-called "pre-fab" process is simply taking the same construction process and detail, not constructing on site, but constructing exactly the same way on a chaise in the factory. Which should not be called "pre-fabrication", "pre-construction" is a more accurate term in this situation. We are at the stage of rethinking what "pre-fab" environment could bring to us. It is necessary to start from the very beginning. We architects, when facing robot arm, CNC, 3D printer and laser tools, the right state of mind does not exist. House, not being part of the Real Estate, a purely machine for dwelling, could finally embrace the most advanced manufacturing technologies. We as designers, are necessary to start from the very beginning.

- Quotes from < Towards a New Architecture >, Le Corbusier, 1927

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“IF YOUR CONTRIBUTION HAS BEEN VITAL, THERE WILL ALWAYS BE SOMEBODY TO PICK UP WHERE YOU LEFT OFF, AND THAT WILL BE YOUR CLAIM TO IMMORTALITY.” - Ernst May, 6th August, 1931. From < The Dream of the Factory-Made House >, Walter Groupius and Konrad Wachsmann, 1984

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PRECEDENTS

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PLUG-IN CITY

“A new generation of architecture must arise with forms and spaces which seem to reject the precepts of ‘Modern’ yet in fact retains those precepts. We have chosen to bypass the decaying Bauhaus image which is an insult to functionalism.” The Plug-In City, by the avant-garde group Archigram. Though never built, their projects and ideas provoked fascinating debates, combining architecture, technology and society; when Plug-In City was proposed in 1964, it offered a fascinating new approach to urbanism, reversing traditional perceptions of infrastructure’s role in the city. This provocative project suggests a hypothetical fantasy city, containing modular residential units that “plug in” to a central infrastructural mega machine.The Plug-in City is in fact not a city, but a constantly evolving megastructure that incorporate residences, transportation and other essential services–all movable by giant cranes. Persistent precedents and concerns of modernism lay at the heart of Plug-In City’s theoretical impulse, not limited to the concept of collective living, integration of transportation and the accommodation of rapid change in the urban environment. It suggested a nomadic way of life and, more importantly, a liberation from the modernist answer of suburbia.

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METABOLISM

" Individuals should be protected by capsules in which they can reject information they do not need and in which they are sheltered from information they do not want, thereby allowing an individual to recover his subjectivity and independence" - kisho kurokawa Nakagin Capsule Tower Building by kurokawa, a residential and office tower comprised of modular units located in tokyo. Built in 1972, the structure demonstrates the success and longevity of these construction methods as it is still in use today without the replacement of any capsules. The individual capsules are 2.3 m Ă&#x2014; 3.8 m x 2.1 m (7.5 ft x 12 ft x 6.9 ft) and include a bed, storage area and a small bathroom, just enough space for one person. the concrete units were prefabricated off site in a factory and shipped to the location upon completion to be attached to central blocks. Each pod was fully equipped, much like a hotel, enabling the residents to live there without the hassle of moving in. A built-in television, fixtures, sheets and even a toothbrush was included in each individual habitat. In japan, prefabricated housing was developed in the 1950s and 1960s to produce housing using factory-made components that could be assembled on site. one of the precursors of this prefab architecture was syowa station, designed by asada takashi, meanwhile, kurokawa kisho fitted all the functions of a house into a detachable capsule that could be swapped in and out to accommodate changes in the urban environment.

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Lesson From Mobile Home

"I live in Ravinia Estates and I highly recommend not moving here. We pay $325/month for a yard that floods so bad it is still soaked 3 days later. Our retaining wall is made up of rotting railroad ties. " "Landlord is slumlord" "I see people note the children roaming around... and bash each-others heads in with stones." " The living conditions are appalling in most of the trailers,Service? No, no service. No one to look to for help, and I don't even know if the police do their rounds here anymore." There are about 9 million families living in mobile home parks across the whole country. However, these parks are usually not a very friendly place. Despite all the advantages of the "pre-fab" construction method brought, the main selling point for mobile home is just for low costs. Which immediately broke the utopian dream of these trailer parks from being a mobile-lifestyle paradise, instead they become mobile slums. Lack of infrastructural service, away from essential urban assets, people living there are way from job opportunities, education resource, health service. These parks gradually become places for criminals and drug dealers. When come to redevelopment plan, city councile usually decide to close down these parks, which end up with many innocent families lost their place to live. The lesson from Mobile home again prove the fact that, what`s really matters for housing is not the house itself, it is the neighborhood, the infrastructural elements, urban assets, these essential daily life elements togather that makes our individual houses successful. House is a simple container that defines private spaces for individual dwellings from the neighborhood environment.

- Quotes from Google Map review

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Country Club Gardens Mobile Home Park (1939-1989) Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1984

Sequoia Gardens Mobile Home Park Santa Rosa, California, 2011

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Trailwood Mobile Home Park North Charleston, South Carolina, 2013

Mount Pleasant Mobile Home Park Minster, UK, 2008

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WE SHOULD FOCUS ON CREATING SUCCESSFUL NEIGHBORHOODS TO MAKE INDIVIDUAL DWELLINGS SUCCESSFUL

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SITE

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SITE

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From Automobile to Mobile Home

"I live in Ravinia Estates and I highly recommend not moving here. We pay $325/month for a yard that floods so bad it is still soaked 3 days later. Our retaining wall is made up of rotting railroad ties. " "Landlord is slumlord" "I see people note the children roaming around... and bash each-others heads in with stones." " The living conditions are appalling in most of the trailers,Service? No, no service. No one to look to for help, and I don't even know if the police do their rounds here anymore." There are about 9 million families living in mobile home parks across the whole country. However, these parks are usually not a very friendly place. Despite all the advantages of the "pre-fab" construction method brought, the main selling point for mobile home is just for low costs. Which immediately broke the utopian dream of these trailer parks from being a mobile-lifestyle paradise, instead they become mobile slums. Lack of infrastructural service, away from essential urban assets, people living there are way from job opportunities, education resource, health service. These parks gradually become places for criminals and drug dealers. When come to redevelopment plan, city councile usually decide to close down these parks, which end up with many innocent families lost their place to live. Drive to what you need or Live with what you need ?

The lesson from Mobile home again prove the fact that, what`s really matters for housing is not the house itself, it is the neighborhood, the infrastructural elements, urban assets, these essential daily life elements togather that makes our individual houses successful. House is a simple container that defines private spaces for individual dwellings from the neighborhood environment.

Existing Site Condition

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With a Neighborhood On Site

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Transforming the Landscape of the Supermarket

Supermarket + Parking

Supermarket is one of the major infrastructures that support the American suburbia life style. The depending on the service radians, population and the average income, the size of the supermarket is totally based on the mathematical calculation. Which end up with a huge parking lot that is surrounded by big-box supermarkets, and our site is in this typical situation. In order to bring people to these big boxes, the first step is to create an appropriate street to bring street life to the site. The solution is quite simple, instead of putting everything in one sealed big box, we could take some of the retail and service out, and put them one the other side of the street, instead of a big box facing empty parking space. When the street is physically constructed, there would be more people spend more time one the street, which means more potential profit for shop owners. Which eventually create job opportunity for other forms of service such as restaurant, barbershop or coffee shop.

Supermarket + Street + ServIce + Parking

Supermarket + Street + ServIce + Residents = Neighborhood

With all these elements emerging out, all elements that are needed to support a lively neighborhood is ready. Them housing project could be built in any form to allow people to live with all the urban elements within walking distance. And the next step is all about how to plan a housing development that is affordable, high quality and could be built in short amount of time.

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Urban Transformation

Existing Infrastructure

Insert Infrastructure for Mobile House

A Transforming Urban Environment

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Brentwood Neighborhood Population in 2012: 8,035 (100% urban, 0% rural). Population change since 2000: +4.4% Median resident age: 35.0 years Missouri median age: 42.8 years Estimated median house or condo value in 2011: $180,092 (it was $116,500 in 2000) Brentwood: $180,092 Missouri: $136,900 Mean prices in 2011: All housing units: $240,700; Detached houses: $269,866; Townhouses or other attached units: $160,519; In 2-unit structures: $158,056; In 3-to-4-unit structures: $202,377; In 5-or-more-unit structures: $174,812; Mobile homes: $139,176 Median gross rent in 2011: $1,049. Workers who live and work in this city: 704 Mean travel time to work (commute): 20.4 minutes

- Numbers and figures from City-Data.com "http://www.city-data.com/city/Brentwood-Missouri.html"

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Urban Center

Connectivity

Parking

Facade

The site has large supermarkets like Dieburge, Best Buy, Target, Trader Joe`s, Bed Bath & Beyond and other retail markets. Also, one office tower and a 10-story parking garage.

There are two major gap that seperate the site into three isolated parts, one is created by the metro line, the other is created by the huge retaining wall.

The site is a typical suburban shoping center, with huge ground parking lot surrounded by big-box structure supermarkets.

The existing streets have only one facade, while the other side is totally open to the huge parking lot. There are no sense of street at all.

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Program

Existing

The site is a typical suburban shopping center, big-box supermarket with huge parking lots. The first thing for the program is to create street life. On the opposite side of the big-box façade, another elevation need to be constructed to physically create the street, behind the new façade filled with retail programs such as pharmacy, newsstands, deli taken out from deep inside the supermarket, bring life to the street. With activities brought to street, daily services could be added in to better support the street life, small shops like barber shop, coffee shop, pizza shop. When the street is equipped with these elements that support daily life, it would attracts people moving to live nearly. Pre-fab mobile house unit is key for this transformation to take place. First of all, it greatly reduced the budget, since there is actually no houses need to be built, all developer has to do is provide essential infrastructure for houses to “park” and plug in. Second, all the residences are renting the lots, upgrade developments could take place in a more planned manner. The program for transforming the site from a suburban shopping center into a lively neighborhood is classified into four categories:

Minimal

1. Commercial 2. Residential 3. Landscape 4. Parking

Maximum

100

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COMMERCIAL

101

PARK YOUR HOUSE LANDSCAPE

RESIDENTIAL

PARKING SPACE

Existing

Proposal

Existing

Proposal

Existing

Proposal

Existing

Proposal

Dieburge: Trader Joe`s: Target: Bed Bath & Beyond: Other:

Mixed-Use Street-facing Shops: Coffee Shop News Stand Pizza Shop Bar & Restaurant Deli Barber Shop ... Proposed Total: 12,000 sqm 2.9 Acres

None

Single Unit (14'X16'): 840 sqf Ground Lots (20'X90'): 1,800 sqf Lots Number: 144 Ground Floor Area: 25,920 sqm Docks Number (up to 4 stories): 574 Peak Population (2People/Unit): 1,148 Max Floor Area: 367,360 sqm

None

Sports Field Theme Park Natural Park

Ground Parking Lots Number: 1650

Above Ground Parking Lots: 1650

Land Use Total: 46,567 sqm 11.5 Acres

Existing Total : 46,567 sqm Land Use Total: 46,567 sqm 11.5 Acres

Land Use Total: 49,060 sqm 12 Acres

Existing Total: 49, 060 sqm Land Use Total: 61,060 sqm 14.9 Acres

Population: 288 to 1148 Docks Number: 144 to 574 Land Use Total: 25,920 sqm 6.4 Acres

Proposed Total:

21,600 sqm

Land Use Total:

21,600 sqm 5.3 Acres

102

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103

Bibliography Le Corbusier. Towards a New Architecture. Courier Dover Publications, 1931 Peter Cook. Archigram. Princeton Architectural Press, 1999 Michael Franklin. Beyond Metabolism. Architectural Record Books, 1978 Colin Davies. The Prefabricated Home. Reaktion Books, 2005 Gilbert Herbert. Sythetic Vision of Walter Gropius. Witwatersrand University Press, 1959 Gilbert Herbert. The Dream of the Factory-Made House: Walter Gropius and Konrad Wachsmann. The MIT Press, 1984 Eduardo Catalano. Housing Systems: Seven Studies of Factory-Produced Steel and Concrete Modular Units. The MIT Press, 1970 Mika Taanila and Marko Home. Tomorrow`s House from Yesterday. Desura, 2002 Charles Peterson. Early American Prefabrication. Gazette Des Beaux-Art, 1948 Ingeborg Flagge and Jochen Visscher. Kisho Kurokawa: Metabolism and Symbiosis. Jovis, 2005 Barry Bergdoll and Peter Christensen. Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling. The museum of Modern Art, 2008