In South Korea, a family of seven stood behind the development of an ingenious project with a very tight budget. A single-story home of 100sqm was carefully designed with various prefabricated materials. Recycled shipping containers assume the main role in the construction, minimizing time and waste of material. A pitched roof structure shelters a composition of three container modules: one for the service areas – kitchen and bathroom – while the other two serve as living and sleeping areas. Continue reading →

As an Eco-friendly architecture buff I was glad to hear about a new kind of prefab called Mesocore Homes. It’s actually an interesting hybrid combo consisting of a shipping container and prefabricated components. This unique house ships as a 20′ container, but once placed at the final building site it expands to a 1000 sq ft green sustainable home with off the grid capabilities. Continue reading →

In Christchurch, New Zealand a meaningful number of urban infrastructures were lost in a big earthquake. The outcome to this was the Re:START village project – a unique shopping mall made out of shipping containers! 27 stores inhabit colored stacked boxes, red, yellow, green and blue are now shinning proudly in the city center of Christchurch. Continue reading →

To reduce construction time and costs in architecture, the option is quite simple: prefab. In Santiago de Chile there’s a prefabricated house that reinforces this statement by using second hand shipping containers as the main module for the design of this unusual home. The challenge was to adapt these modular pieces to a very sloped site near the Andes Mountains. An ingenious solution was adopted by letting the containers rest on the slope, following the natural topography of the site… hence, the name of the project: Casa Oruga, which means Caterpillar House. Continue reading →

Do you believe in magic? The following project will show you the power of magic in architecture. Recycling old shipping containers for a variety of needs is today’s trend, especially when the source of the new construction is left exposed as a manifest of its flexibility. 3x Shipping Container Home presents a different approach to prefab architecture, as container units serve as the structural framework but the final building doesn’t show any kind of reference to its recycled structure. Continue reading →

Affordable homes can be modernly chic – and green too! – as recycled shipping containers are becoming the next building blocks of architecture. Check out our favorite top 10 container houses from around the world.

A real point of interest can be found in France in the form of a beautiful cross-shaped family home constructed from four colorful shipping containers.
Photography: Javier Callejas. Continue reading →

The life of a shipping container is typically not glamorous. Packed to its gills, these containers travel across the globe among up to as many as 15,000 similar containers on a large ship. Once their cargo is unloaded, they’re most often left at the port where they arrived. In the case of Sleeping Around – a shipping container hotel along the river Schelde – that port is Antwerp, Belgium. Continue reading →

Recycled shipping containers can be a box full of surprises for architects. Located in Hackney City Farm, Magnificent HQ is the headquarters of a non-profit organization called Magnificent Revolution. Created from a converted shipping container, this multipurpose space serves as a studio for creativity and learning. The space demonstrates and teaches energy efficiency principles, beginning with its own example as a prototype. Continue reading →

Sometimes, exceptional situations lead to outstanding results: Temporary Container Housing is one of these surprising solutions for natural disasters. This multi-story housing project provides 188 homes in Onagawa for those left homeless by the Japanese earthquake and tsunami. The most remarkable detail about this building lies in the use of recycled shipping containers, a mass-produced global module conceived to be transported worldwide by trains, ships and trucks. Continue reading →

In Nantes, France there’s a wonderful example of how to merge recycled containers with existing architecture: House extension. The request for a small extension for a suburban 1960’s house lead to a pragmatic solution that takes full advantage of the mass produced module designed for transportation worldwide: steel shipping containers. Continue reading →