Shipping Container Homes

Porta-Bach. Photo courtesy of TreeHugger.

Steel cargo containers are used to ship products all over the world. Though they are made sturdy to withstand rigorous, repetitive use, they eventually wear out. Retired shipping containers have to be disposed of some how. Or do they? Old shipping containers can actually be reused as prefabricated building materials and be made into homes.

Types of Shipping Container Homes

Lloyd Alter's Crate Expectations: 12 Shipping Container Housing Ideas looks as some different housing options that simply - or sometimes not so simply - modify shipping containers to create living spaces. The Porta-Bach, Future Shack, prefabricated hotel, LOT-EK Highrise, and condo are the most practical designs Alter looks at.

Porta-Bach and Future Shack

The Porta-Bach and Future Shack are each made up of a single shipping container. Alter's article on the Porta-Bach lists storage space, "bunk beds, double bed room, dressing room, kitchen and bathroom" as features of Cecile Bonnifait's and William Giesan's Porta-Bach. Compared to the Porta-Bach, Sean Godsell's Future Shack is very minimalistic. In his article on the Future Shack, Alter writes how "a number of units can be shipped together" because "it's entirely self-contained." Alter also talks about how "the refugee and homeless housing unit [Future Shack] was [. . .] a top entry in a contest held by Architecture for Humanity, a non-profit group that was organized to bring design smarts and efficiency to displaced peoples in areas of need" in that same article. 

Exterior of Future Shack.
Photo courtesy of TreeHugger.

Interior of Future Shack.
Photo courtesy of TreeHugger.

Prefabricated Hotel, LOT-EK Highrise and Condo

Prefabricated Hotel, LOT-EK Highrise and condo are composed of many shipping containers put together to form large structures. The prefabricated hotel is Travelodge's solution to events that cause a temporary surge in the number of people seeking out hotels. Travelodge's idea is to stack ready-made shipping container rooms together to form a temporary hotel that can be moved and reconstructed as needed. The LOT-EK Highrise design stacks shipping containers to form its structure too. According to Alters article on the LOT-EK Highrise, it is intended as an "artists loft building with commercial base." The final shipping container building Alter looks at is a condo planned to be built in Detroit, Michigan. In his article on the condo, Alter wrote "according to the Detroit Free Press, 'The project would stack empty containers four high, cut in windows and doors, install plumbing, stairways and heating, and add amenities such as balconies and landscaped patios.'"

Benefits of Shipping Container Homes

New container home design thinks outside the box by Mathew Knight talks about a few benefits of repurposing shipping containers to make homes. One benefit is that shipping containers can act be used to transport building materials before becoming a building material themselves. This takes away the need to truck them out once a project is finished. Other benefits mentioned in the article include that "the containers form part of the foundation for the building, [aircraft structural engineer] Green says, as well as being a building block that aids the quick and easy assembly of the frame around it." The biggest benefit the article talks about is the value such repurposing has for emergency situations. According to architect Matthew Coates who is quoted within the article, "It's an excellent option for emergency housing -- the containers could be shipped to a site in large quantities, set down and assembled very quickly." This is the intended use of Godsell's Future Shack, though Bonnifiat's and Giesan's Porta-Bach could potentially used in a similar way.

About

Lloyd Alter

Alter is a design editor and writer for Treehugger. In his profile, Alter says he "is a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Toronto, and is licenced to practice by the Ontario Association of Architects." 

Treehugger

Treehugger, according to its About Us page, "is the leading media outlet dedicated to driving sustainability mainstream."

Mathew Knight

Mathew Knight is a journalist for CNN. 

Cable News Network

CNN is an international news company owned by Time Warner. According to CNN's About us page, "CNN.com is among the world's leaders in online news and information delivery."

Critique

Backed by media outlets, Alter's and Knight's articles may have a bit of media bias; but, they can be trusted well enough. Altair's articles come from a source of authority on their subject who quotes sources of authority for each specific topic while Knight quotes experts to give information in his article weight. It would be nice if Alter contributed some of his own opinion as an architect to the articles since he would be speaking as someone knowledgeable. Knight's article would be better if he included more and specific information about shipping container construction.