Prefabrication experiments - 215 - oddities - 06 - The cabin for folks – Volks-kabin

A member of The Architect’s Collaborative founded by Walter Gropius in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1946, architect Edward A. Cuetera designed a number of mid-century modern prefab houses based on a timber construction system similar to Karl Koch’s well-known Techbuilt homes. Cuetera through his company, The Core House Corporation developed the Core-Plus X house: a small modular design organized around a prefabricated service core which included a kitchen wall and an adjacent bathroom space.  A (x-variable) number of 12x12 units of flexible spaces could surround the core potentially creating a large number of adaptable plans on simple parameters (Core plus (x)). 

Cuetera and his company contributed to a fertile hub of prefabrication exploration in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. A number of prototypes were designed and built by The Core House Corporation in the region.  The timber post and beam structure was completed with modular panels of various materials dimensioned on the division of a primary 3,6 m grid into smaller interchangeable components. Based on the same principles Gropius had argued for «variable architecture based on pre-manufactured components to realize the economies of repetition» Cuetera also promoted the “volks-kabin” a cabin for everyman. 

A modified A-frame or butler frame, the raised triangular vault structure was designed to be made from timber beams (bent roof beams) placed on a linear grid distanced about 1,8 m. The arched triangles spanned 5,5 m to create a free one directional plan. The kit-of-parts system would be delivered with erection instructions and could be built on a simple raft foundation. The roof and wall envelope, continuous 2x6 timber planking also braced the pointed frames against lateral loads. Entirely bolted together, one can easily imagine these simply built cabins as modest homes and clusters within a do-it-yourself community.  It is not clear if any of these “volks-kabins” were actually built, however a number of Cuetera’s Core-Plus X Houses and one-off prototypes were built and published in architectural journals. 

Brattle street in Cambridge Massachusetts was the setting for the foundation of the Core house corporation, and numerous modern inspired explorations, as The Architects Collaborative designed 42 brattle street in Cambridge where the firm worked and inspired modernism in their community.

The Volks-kabin system