Building the American Dream: A Brief History of Pre-Fabricated Homes
Sparano + Mooney Architecture strives to create one-of-a-kind architectural designs that result in timeless, contemporary and sustainable homes for our clients. The uniqueness of the custom residences we design matches the singularity of our clients, and it is this inimitable quality of both that continues to drive our practice.
Aspen Meadow conceptual construct; designed by Sparano + Mooney Architecture. Photography by Lucy Call
The homes we design are bespoke and cutting-edge, and require complex engineering to execute. However, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries the practice of architecture was at times a wholly different affair that utilized the emerging modern manufacturing technique of pre-fabrication, which helped democratize housing design for growing populations across North America.
COOKIE-CUTTER FROM A CATALOG
Though pre-fabricated homes – also known as “pre-cut,” “kit” or “mail-order” homes – varied in aesthetics throughout their popularity, their raison d'être remained largely the same: to provide access to affordable housing stock that would suit the need for comfortable, climate-appropriate shelter, and that could be constructed simply and quickly. Manufacturers sold homes in varying sizes and styles, but provided at fixed cost all materials to construct the house (typically excluding concrete and masonry, which would need to be arranged by the customer). D.N Skillings and D.B. Flint published their catalog Sectional Portable Houses in 1861, marketing their buildings’ ease of construction as “so simple that two or three men without mechanical knowledge, or experience in building, can set up one of them in less than three hours.” Their designs were not only for home design: they also offered architectural plans for schools, offices, warehouses, and chapels. In 1883, L. Forest & Co. claimed their structures offered the “cheapest, strongest, and warmest portable houses on the market” to clients including immigrant settlers of the upper Midwest region, known for its harsh climate.
MODERN + MANUFACTURED
At the turn of the 20th century, the purpose of these buildings was honed and a plethora of designs for pre-fabricated residences was available to eager homeowners. Companies manufacturing these affordable pre-cut homes proliferated: Aladdin Houses and Liberty Ready-Cut Homes of Bay City, Michigan; Hodgson Portable Houses of Boston, Massachusetts; and “Presto-Up” Patented Bolt-Together Cottages of Chicago, Illinois all promised customers efficient residential designs that would be shipped direct-to-consumer then assembled on-site either by the homeowner or a local contractor. Prices varied – for example, the Sears Hamilton home cost $1,379 in 1916 ($40,673 with 2023/4 price-adjusted inflation), while the Sears Martha Washington model sold for up to $3,727 in 1921 (or approximately $60,170 today).
Sears is perhaps the most well-known producer of mail-order homes, and launched its Sears Modern Homes catalog in 1908. These kits provided all the materials and blueprints required for construction of Sears’ various models, and all the trimmings were included: light fixtures, cabinetry, hardware, gutters and garage doors. The guess-work (and, arguably, any individuality) was removed from the homebuying and building process. Customization was not unheard-of, but was largely left to the homeowner to tackle with their choice of interior furnishings and decorations. Homeowners did not seem deterred by a lack of agency – by the time the Sears catalog ceased publication in 1940, it is estimated that the company had sold up to 75,000 of these homes.
POST-WAR PRE-FABRICATED PERFECTION
These homes were popular especially in the post-war period, largely because returning GIs were able and eager to buy a home for their families but were simply unable to find the stock from which to purchase. In the aftermath of World War II, the private housing market was ill-equipped to provide homes to meet soaring demand. Many of the resulting pre-fab dwellings were modest, one-story models that offered the creature comforts that wartime austerity had stripped from the notion of “home.” These catalogs were not simply selling shelters; they were selling the American Dream.
One of the most striking examples of the post-war kit home is the Lustron, which capitalized on the boom in demilitarized manufacturing as well as government funding for construction companies able to deliver housing. Founded in 1947, Lustron sought to innovate and rationalize affordable housing by introducing mass-production techniques into the construction industry. The homes were assembled from pre-fabricated, enameled-steel components and assembled on-site by a local crew with the help of an accompanying manual. The brand was the subject of a nationwide marketing campaign promoting the Lustron’s modernity and affordability. Unfortunately, the cost of raw materials, difficulties with manufacturing and shipping infrastructure, and tenuous relationships with distributors, lenders and frustrated consumers bankrupted the company by 1951. Only 2,680 of these homes were ever built, and only an estimated 1,500 remain as icons of post-war architectural home economics.
After almost a century of immense popularity, the modern kit home’s appeal declined in the mid-20th century in favor of suburban tract house subdivisions, a form of inexpensive and abundant housing built in bulk by developers. As Utah and California architects who care deeply about the history of building design, as well as the history of American vernacular architecture, we are fascinated by the concept of the kit home. Though we specialize in designing sophisticated heritage homes and mountain-modern architecture in the American West, we are nevertheless indebted to the humble essence of architecture as a service that provides a basic human need – shelter. For this reason, our Salt Lake City architects and Los Angeles architects produce a wide range of sustainable residential architecture solutions that are carefully-crafted at multiple scales and that will serve generations to come on complex sites throughout the western mountain region.
SOURCES:
“Assembly Required: A Brief History of 20th-Century Kit House Designs”, by Mike Jackson, Architect Magazine online, August 2, 2018
“To Build a Lego House”, by Jeremy Pi, The Harvard Urban Review online, April 12, 2018
“Why do Cookie-Cutter Neighborhoods Exist?”, by Kate Kershner, HowStuffWorks online, May 2, 2012
“Lustron”, The Ohio History Connection
“Where Art Thou Hamilton?”, by Rose Thornton for Searshomes.org, accessed October 28, 2021