Being mobile

We're currently in talks with a mobile home insurance company, who are looking for a rebrand. It got us thinking about the characteristics of transportable homes and how the recent growth in mobile housing design is making them an attractive and relevant model for modern day living.

Mobile homes have been around for centuries, with the earliest example tracing back to roaming bands of gypsies, who traveled with their horse drawn caravans as far back as the 1500s. With no fixed residence and freedom to move from place to place, there is an appealing quality to the nomadic nature of mobile homes.



In the past mobile homes have also been seen as way of providing more economical but flexible housing solutions. Such as modernist architect, Wells Coates who designed a modular housing system based on movable units, which could be transported to other locations. These RUP's (Room Unit Production) sit in a metal frame structure that could be replicated all over the country, providing multiple living locations. The vision was that dwellings could be 'ordered off the shelf' and added to or moved over the years if required, it was the Ikea of modernist architecture but sadly, was never built.



Recently there's been a bit of a mobile home revival, attributed to people searching for a solution to the global problem of over-crowded cities. Architectural practices are coming up with contemporary versions, such as Werner Aisslinger of Studio Aisslinger who recently completed a small mountainside mobile living unit in Ritten, Italy.



Or Hangar Design Group's beautiful portable cabins, 'for wandering travelers and those who love exploring and staying in nature without giving up the comforts of home.'



This new approach to an iconic form of architecture will hopefully start to challenge the notion that home is the piece of land it sits on.

Sleeping with the fishes

Architecture firm Matharoo associates, built 'House with balls' outside Ahmedabad (India), for an aquarium shop owner to function as a place to breed fish as well as a weekend retreat.

The concrete balls were used as inexpensive counterweights for the continuous row of push-up shutters on either side of the linear living area give the house its name. These counterweights hold the shutters in place at any angle, but when the shutters are fully opened they totally disappear from view as they are submerged into the pond or lie upon the grass, both of which lie adjacent to the house on either side.

A clever design solution that combines functionality with aesthetic beauty.