Prefabrication experiments - 185 - Exhibition houses - 06 - Moelven Senior

The small, factory produced and highly standardized house is an expression of post-war living often associated with North America. Industrialized building culture applied to the single family dwelling reformed building strategies and the way in which house building knowledge was shared.  The personal and collective knowledge was lost as building became specialized, evolving from a customized craft to manufacturing. Established on the catalogue of plan types, which simplified the task of house production, consumers chose from a predetermined set of houses. This was the key to normalizing building for the masses. Before industrialization, house building knowledge and actual construction was a shared social process. The exploding use of the undemanding balloon frame helped globalize the small house type in Europe as well as in America. Norway’s industry produced an interesting take on the industrialized dwelling.  

Although the country’s architectural culture gave us great architects/theorists like Christian Norberg-Schulz who developed his own modernist inspired prototype dwelling for the middle class (Planeveien 14 ) in Oslo in 1955, the industry’s take on prefab was only marginally influenced by architectural culture. The industry, as in other countries moved to a more traditionally inspired version of the post-war mass-produced house with its modular plan, pitched roof and simple placement of small windows, dissociated from the modernist glass enclosed prefab dwelling.   

Moelven’s (Norwegian prefab house builder) simple house guide or catalogue expressed the industrial movement that was able to offer affordable and modest options for living. While architects continued to dream about affordability and mass production, the industry delivered.  The house system was based on juxtaposed manufactured segments. The segments were connected to infrastructure, anchored to their foundations and stitched together on site; wood cladding and metal roofing completed the «Norwegian vernacular» aesthetic. The straightforward plan surrounded back-to-back plumbing walls and was based on a 50-cm grid. Devices, or malleable spaces, such as carports or mudrooms could be adjoined as required.  The house was available in different sizes from the 48 sq.m. (mini)  to the 144 sq.m. (luxury model). The guide’s marketing strategy is familiar exposing the lasting, although ineffectual, conceptual link between the evolving prefab sector and the automobile industry. 

Melvin house catalogue and options