Inspiring Houses: The Dwell Homes/Resolution:4

We've written before about The Dwell Homes, a set of prefab homes designed by three different architects and manufactured by Empyrean. First, we explored the Flatpack House by Lazor Office.

Let's look at the home offered by Resolution:4 Architecture.

The firm is based out of Manhattan and rode the first wave of the new prefab movement. At the beginning, Resolution:4 offered modern modular components that could be arranged in hundreds of configurations.

Dwell magazine's first dwell home commission was awarded to Resolution:4 and the design and build process was documented in successive issues of the publication. This project was dubbed "arguably the most high profile modern prefab house in America" by The Washington Post.

The floorplans.

The lower floor is composed of a living/dining/kitchen area that is rather compact, with a separate study/den behind the service core. Across the covered parking area is a flexible space that could be used for storage, a studio or workshop.

The upper floor includes expansive decks, a master suite, guest bedroom and yet another den/media room/flex space.

At over 2600 square feet, this Dwell Home has a love of living space, both indoor and outdoor. And plenty of flexible space as well. The downstairs study could easily be used as a third bedroom and the studio is completely open for interpretation, although it doesn't have plumbing utilities.

I admire the expansive decks and the ample square footage of the home. The house would interact with the outdoors and would be well suited to a rural or wooded setting.

However, I'm troubled by the fact that the living areas of the home are so chopped up. I don't know about you, but we live and entertain in the areas closest to the kitchen, and the main living/dining/kitchen area of this house seems remarkably cramped for 2600 square feet. I could see the upstairs media room gathering dust a great deal of the time and the studio becoming one big junk room.

That said, the fact that this house was actually erected and is being lived in is commendable and exciting. There are a lot of prefab homes on the market. However, you don't see many that actually get built.

And that's why the Dwell home was the most high-profile prefab house in America. It actually exists outside of paper and ink.

We'll explore the 3rd Dwell home soon.