Buildings
Record's House of the Month: Modular I, II, and III in Kansas
City
(archrecord.construction.com - 06/05/2006)
By Ingrid
Spencer
Studio 804, Inc.
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Click here for slide show.
Photo courtesy of Studio 804, Inc. |
Modernist prefab isn’t just for
artsy Californians or Europeans these days. The fact that
Dan Rockhill has a wait list for his Studio 804 prefab homes
in Kansas City, Kansas proves that modernist modular homes
are in demand across the country. Studio 804, a self-funded,
not-for-profit corporation affiliated with the University
of Kansas School of Architecture and Urban Design, has just
completed its third such house, called Modular III, which
sold for about $170,000 before construction had even been
completed. The approximately 1,200-square-foot home, fabricated
in six transportable 10-by-20-foot segments in a warehouse
in Lawrence, Kansas, and moved by truck to the site, is the
eighth designed and built entirely by Rockhill’s graduate
and undergraduate students.
Since 1995, Rockhill’s students,
who carry their own insurance, have spent their last semester
of study designing and constructing a home. The first five
were built in Lawrence, where the University is located. But
Rockhill says they ran out of places to build there. “These
are meant to be infill homes,” says Rockhill, “and
we ran out of infill property to build on. That kind of land
just got too expensive for us, and although we did a home
for Habitat for Humanity, what we do is just so different
from what their needs are.” Rockhill says the Studio
804 homes are more for young, moderate-income families that
want to live in urban areas. So when Kansas City developer,
City Vision Ministries, came to him with interest in a partnership,
Rockhill was delighted. “Their goal is to revamp underserved
urban areas in Kansas City, and that was a perfect fit for
us,” he says. The problem was the distance. “I didn’t
want my students to be driving home from the site at two in
the morning. So, I thought, heck, we’ve done five houses,
we can do anything. I investigated what it would take to lease
a warehouse and build a modular house here in Lawrence, and
then ship it to the site. It seemed like it would work.”
It did work, and Modular I was underway.
Modular
I
Studio 804 worked in a development partnership with City Vision
Ministries, the Unified Government of Wyandotte County, and
the Rosedale Development Association, which set up the physical
and financial groundwork to transform a former neighborhood
dumpsite into a viable building lot. “I have a weakness
for breathing new life into old areas,” says Rockhill.
Everyone involved in the partnership shared his belief that
dwellings built with underlying Modernist principles and woven
into the older urban fabric can serve as a stimulus for re-energizing
these established neighborhoods. Modular I is a simple, two-bedroom
home built around a central core that houses all utilities.
It has bamboo floors throughout, and is finished in recycled
aluminum and clad with Brazilian hardwood. The home was purchased
before it was even moved from the warehouse.
Modular
II
With one successful project under its belt, Studio 804 began
its second prefab house for the same client/partnership, though
in a different downtrodden urban neighborhood. This time the
program was extended to include an attached garage and a third
bedroom. The students again used as many recycled materials
as they could, including channel glass that came from a Kansas
City museum expansion, as well as recycled aluminum cladding
on parts of the exterior, and recycled maple flooring within.
As with the first home, Modular II sold before it left the
warehouse.
Modular
III and beyond
For the third home, completed in the summer of 2006 and also
purchased before completion, Studio 804 worked with a nonprofit
development company called El Centro, whose mission is to
provide opportunities for working-class families in Kansas
City. This time, the site, in the Rosedale neighborhood, was
acquired through the Land Bank, a source of foreclosure properties
from which the county wished to divest.
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Again, except for the licensed trades
(electrical, plumbing, etc.) the Studio 804 students took
charge of all aspects of the building process. They created
a separate safe-room in the site-built garage, used vertical
grain Douglas fir siding over a water-shedding vapor shield,
and negotiated with an insulation company to get wet-blown
high performance cellulose insulation donated, as well as
other materials. “It’s a real confidence builder,”
says Lisa Reed, who spent her last semester working on Modular
III before receiving her Masters in architecture. “Dan
suggests a direction for us, then he lets us go. He will then
reel us in if we go too far, or correct us when we make mistakes,
but essentially it’s all us. It’s a very comprehensive
experience, and I feel like because of it I understand a level
of responsibility I never knew about before.”
“Budgets, negotiations, inspections,
hands-on building—these are the most important things
in architecture and these are the exact things students never
get in studio,” says Rockhill. He admits that the students
“beg, borrow, and steal” to get things done, resorting
to tears if they must. “These kids are battling City
Hall,” he says. “Our biggest opponent is a Kansas
City city planner who just hates modern architecture.”
Much to the chagrin of this shortsighted city employee, Studio
804 continues to find people who love what it’s doing
enough to sign up to buy before the houses are even finished.
“We know our market, and we’ve been lucky enough
to find developers who are with us all the way,” says
Rockhill, who is now trying to change the curriculum of the
class to make it a year instead of just one semester. “This
is all the genesis of the students’ hard work. It’s
how you make architecture in the contemporary world.”
Gross square footage:
1,200 sq. ft. each
Total construction cost:
$140,000, $166,000, $170,000
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