Història
Buildings have been built in one place and reassembled in another throughout history. This was especially true for mobile activities, or for new settlements. Castell d'Elmina, the first fort dels esclaus in Àfrica occidental, was also the first European prefabricated building in Àfrica subsahariana.1: 93 In Amèrica del nord, in 1624 un dels primers edificis at Cap Ann was probably partially prefabricated, and was rapidly disassembled and moved at least once. Joan Rollo described in 1801 earlier use of portable hospital buildings in the Índies Occidentals.2 Possibly the first advertised prefab house was the "Manning cottage". A London carpenter, Henry Manning, constructed a house that was built in components, then shipped and assembled by British emigrants. This was published at the time (advertisement, South Australian Record, 1837) and a few still stand in Australia.3 One such is the Casa de reunions d'amics, Adelaide.45 The peak year for the importation of portable buildings to Australia was 1853, when several hundred arrived. These have been identified as coming from Liverpool, Boston and Singapur (with Chinese instructions for re-assembly).6 In Barbados the Casa de mobles was a form of prefabricated building which was developed by emancipated slaves who had limited rights to build upon land they did not own. As the buildings were moveable they were legally regarded as mobles.7
In 1855 during the Guerra de Crimea, after Florence Nightingale wrote a letter to Els temps, Isambard Kingdom Brunel was commissioned to design a prefabricated modular hospital. In five months he designed the Hospital Renkioi: un hospital d'1,000 pacient, amb innovacions en sanejament, ventilació i vàter amb cisterna.8 Fabricator William Eassie constructed the required 16 units in Molls de Gloucester, shipped directly to the Dardanels. Només utilitzat des del març de 1856 fins al setembre de 1857, va reduir la taxa de mortalitat del 42% al 3,5%.
The world's first prefabricated, pre-cast panelled apartment blocks were pioneered in Liverpool. A process was invented by city engineer John Alexander Brodie, whose inventive genius also had him inventing the football goal net. The tram stables at Walton in Liverpool followed in 1906. The idea was not extensively adopted in Britain, however was widely adopted elsewhere, particularly in Eastern Europe.
Prefabricated homes were produced during the Febre de l'or in the United States, when kits were produced to enable Californian prospectors to quickly construct accommodation. Homes were available in kit form by mail order in the United States in 1908.9
Prefabricated housing was popular during the Segona Guerra Mundial due to the need for mass accommodation for military personnel. The United States used Barraques de Quonset as military buildings, and in the United Kingdom prefabricated buildings used included Cabanes de Nissen and Hangars de botoners. 'Prefabs' were built after the war as a means of quickly and cheaply providing quality housing as a replacement for the housing destroyed during el Blitz. The proliferation of prefabricated housing across the country was a result of the Comitè Burt and the Llei d'habitatge (allotjament temporal) de 1944. Under the Ministeri de Foment Fet a fàbrica d'emergència housing programme, a specification was drawn up and bid on by various private construction and manufacturing companies. After approval by the MoW, companies could bid on Council led development schemes, resulting in whole estates of prefabs constructed to provide accommodation for those made homeless by the War and ongoing neteja de barris marginals.10 Almost 160,000 had been built in the UK by 1948 at a cost of close to £216 million. The largest single prefab estate in Britain11 was at Belle Vale (South Liverpool), where more than 1,100 were built after World War 2. The estate was demolished in the 1960s amid much controversy as the prefabs were very popular with residents at the time.
Prefabs were aimed at families, and typically had an entrance hall, two bedrooms (parents and children), a bathroom (a room with a bath) — which was a novel innovation for many Britons at that time, a separate toilet, a living room and an equipped (not encaixat in the modern sense) kitchen. Construction materials included steel, aluminium, timber or amiant, depending on the type of dwelling. The aluminium Tipus B2 prefab was produced as four pre-assembled sections which could be transported by lorry anywhere in the country.12
The Universal House (pictured left lounge diner right) was given to the Museu a l'Aire Libre de Chiltern after 40 years temporary use. The Mark 3 was manufactured by the Universal Housing Company Ltd, Rickmansworth.
The United States used prefabricated housing for troops during the war and for GIs returning home. Prefabricat classrooms were popular with UK schools increasing their rolls during the Esclat de naixements of the 1950s and 1960s.
Many buildings were designed with a five-ten year life span, but have far exceeded this, with a number surviving today. In 2002, for example, the city of Bristol still had residents living in 700 examples.13 Many UK councils have been in the process of demolishing the last surviving examples of Second World War prefabs in order to comply with the British government's Habitatges dignes estàndard, which came into effect in 2010. There has, however, been a recent revival in prefabricated methods of construction in order to compensate for the United Kingdom's current housing shortage.cal citació
Els prefabricats i el moviment modernista
Els arquitectes estan incorporant dissenys moderns a les cases prefabricades actuals. L'habitatge prefabricat ja no s'ha de comparar amb una casa mòbil pel que fa a l'aspecte, sinó amb la d'un disseny modernista complex.14 There has also been an increase in the use of "green" materials in the construction of these prefab houses. Consumers can easily select between different environmentally friendly finishes and wall systems. Since these homes are built in parts, it is easy for a home owner to add additional rooms or even solar panels to the roofs. Many prefab houses can be customized to the client's specific location and climate, making prefab homes much more flexible and modern than before.
There is a zeitgeist or tendència in architectural circles and the spirit of the age favors the small petjada de carboni of "prefab".
Eficiència
The process of building pre-fabricated buildings has become so efficient in China that a builder in Changsha built a ten-pis building in 28 hours and 45 minutes.15 16
Als països comunistes
Many eastern European countries had suffered physical damage during Segona Guerra Mundial and their economies were in a very poor state. There was a need to reconstruct cities which had been severely damaged due to the war. For example, Varsòvia had been practically razed to the ground under the planned destruction of Warsaw by German forces after the 1944 Aixecament de Varsòvia. The centre of Dresden, Alemanya, havia estat totalment destruïda pel bombardeig aliat de 1945. Stalingrad havia estat en gran part destruït i només un petit nombre d'estructures quedaven en peu.
Prefabricated buildings served as an inexpensive and quick way to alleviate the massive housing shortages associated with the wartime destruction and large-scale urbanització and vol rural.
Edificis comercials prefabricats
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McDonald's uses prefabricated structures for their buildings, and set a record of constructing a building and opening for business within 13 hours (on pre-prepared ground works).17
In the UK, the major supermarkets have each developed a modular unit system to shop building, based on the systems developed by German cost retailer Aldi and the Danish supermarket chain Netto.18