The need for more affordable homes (especially for metropolises) and more environmental friendly construction methods has never been more urgent than now. When our client Seth Krubiner came to us with his idea of a prefabricated house, we were ecstatic. Seth’s goal is to eventually launch a line of affordable and modern prefabricated homes, where clients can easily order modules to build a house through his new company. But first, we’ll build his house; it will be the model home for the new adventure.

The site of the Krubiner Prefab House is located 2 blocks from our office. The property is a long and narrow in-fill lot, in a mixed use area of Emeryville. Planning for a prefab house is not much different than planning for a site-built stick-frame home. For this project, the close proximity to the nearby houses means to bring in light while maintaining privacy is a challenge. The solution is to bring in light with skylights and open up the building on its east and west ends. The north facade is almost entirely opaque with a few punched windows strategically placed to avoid direct alignment with our neighbor’s. On the south facade, glazing is mostly on the upper level and steps back 1/3 of the width of the building, providing our client and his neighbor more privacy.

The Krubiner Prefab House will be built from 7 modules, sizes ranged from the smallest 8’-2”W by 23’-6”L by 13’ H to the biggest 15’-6”W by 39’-6”L by 12’H, which is the maximum size of the truck bed that will deliver the module from the factory. Site work will be done while the modules being built in a factory. And we imagine the entire house will be assembled in one day. I helped the client to arrange neighborhood gatherings and we received many supports from local professionals and residents. We met with the city officials, established good connections, and passed design review with an unanimous vote. We are still in the process of finding a factory, the project has slowed down due to the downturn of the economy world wide. But we are still looking forward to module setting-day.

Update: Krubiner Prefab was finally built in the summer of 2011.