With respect to the original clients who pay large sums for a custom design for themselves, I believe it is wrong for the architect to turn around and mass market that floor plan. (I've witnessed that practice in mass marketing of traditional home plans.)

If, however, the architect sets out to design a house for "the common man" and intends it to be widely reproduced, then efficient, sustainable, modern architecture is certainly preferred over the dumbed-down neo-classical architecture that widely fills America's suburbs.

Very interesting.

I say more power to them. If they are not violating any contractual agreements, why not make more money off of something you've already done?

I don't buy the ethical bs of it being 'wrong'. Business is business. Those that profit thrive and can control their own destiny, those that don't find new ways to profit die.

Also, from what I briefly saw, $4000 for a 2100 sq. ft. is not a bad amount to make for something you've already completed.






(Obviously it diminishes the exotic one off if there are 500 of them, but I'd rather see 500 of the same well designed home than 1 and 499 ugly McMansions)

I wouldn't say thins is new.

What I found interesting is that this idea is suddenly "new," while at the same time a few people from Archinect are very vocal about using or establishing pattern books.

I guess someone is either smart of their own or took a gamble on the crazies here?

In either event, I can't name any off the top of my head-- I almost want to say Neutra. But this isn't a new practice. In the 1920s-1940s, there was a few architects who sold (at least advertised selling) kit homes and plans.

I think this may actually be good for design-based architects. Because it moves the model away from object creation to product creation-- i.e., you're no longer creating singular homes (objects), rather something you can put on a shelf and let a customer decide if they want it.

That can be bad because it could cause firms to overproduce and be ultimately overworked. On the other hand, it gives the firms more freedom to continually produce work.

I think what would make this concept for feasible is if it had some sort of bricks-and-mortars aspect to it. Like you could put a consultant in a department store or tiny shop some place. I feel as if people would be more comfortable in a paper-and-person situation versus buying the next 30 years of their life over the internet.

I like montagneux's idea of putting a consultant in a store... Put them in a Home Depot even... Have a place where home buyers can come and purchase plans, or go home and continue browsing via the web if they like...

Or make an architecture outlet store... Dedicated place for purchasing plans... In the same way that real estate agents pin up listings in their store front windows, designers could post up plans with prices on them in the storefront...

I was thinking...

What if architects went into business as real estate sales as well? What if we opened an architecture studio where the floor above was a standard design practice, but in the floor below, you had the second tier of your business which was real estate sales on one half of the floor, and the other half of the floor was options for new construction...

I was just thinking about the way homes are currently bought and sold... How people go into the market for a home and shop for a home... I think most people look to buy either enw construction built by developers or they buy from a real estate agent, an existing home... The reason most peopel don't think about hiring an architect is because there isn't the same easy marketplace for architects services and it is perceived as overly expensive and complicated...

How can buying a piece of property and building your own custom / or kit home become more accessible to the average homebuyer? What if architects had their offices connected with a real estate business? You buy and sell existing homes, but at the same time, on the other side of the office, you have consultants displaying land properties and plans for houses if you want to build your own... Also remodeling design services... So you make home purchase integrally tied to design services... maybe even include some showrooms...

I'm just thinking about how to make architectural services more accessible to the average joe consumer... something that is as simple and as uncomplicated as purchasing a home...

Some entrepreneur should make the home depot / ikea of architectural services... maybe?

Frank Lloyd Wright only made one Fallingwater, but weren't his Usonian houses meant to be for the masses?

Yes, LiG. He was one of the ones who started this whole pre-planned house concept.

This was a popular thing around the turn of the 20th century. The advent of motorized travel (not necessarily cars but ships and trains) and the increase in the speed of information allowed people to 'purchase' culture from abroad.



This ad is from 1917... for which we still have accurate inflation calculations!

This plan would run around $87.00. Cost to build: $22,007.27.

And this page from Design Review: Volume 5, Issue 1 (March-April 1953) talks about how much "Architecture sucks(TM)," and why the house plan industry is shoddy at best.



With gems such as these:

"The legitimate architectural magazines, of course, have a different purpose—to stimulate the understanding of good design and to provide the means by which the architect can illustrate his work—but not for copying."

"Architects are all the same—at least the face-applying variety that seem to be almost solely responsible for our city facades. Often the only good-looking elevation an office building has is the one to the light well, or facing away from the street. Not that I would like to see these relevations on the street frontage, but they would be preferable by far to the mess of tile, coloured plaster and bronze that is applied to the fronts in the name of architecture.

...

But when you consider that we see as much of the sides and back of a building as we do of its front, and that the sides and backs make up the vast bulk of our total city picture, then one wonders why architects seldom consider a building in its entirety, instead of in terms of plan, section and front elevation."


OMG, Design Review 1953 is like some sort of prophet.
Because here we are, almost 60 years later, having the same discussions!

bRink - what you are suggesting, more or less, is what developers are already doing. A large subdivision, for example, will have a sales office and hire an architect to create/modify plans.


The real barrier is cost. Even the prefab movement could never get costs anywhere near what most people want to pay. Between finding and purchasing land, to going through the process of designing a house - just not time most people have for something that they'll, most likely, end up with almost identical to what is already built.


Where there is room for 'architecture', imho, is in speculative development. If it is there, people will buy it. There are examples of more contemporary places, like Prospect (although it feels Alice in Wonderland-ish to me), that are successful.

Again, the problem is money. Most architects don't have the resources to do development or the expertise.



A lot goes back to schooling. Architect's just aren't taught the business side of the world (that, with money, makes the world go round). If there were more alternatives promoted in school we'd get more ambitious youngsters and less "I wanna be the next Frank Gehry" graduates.

As most have said, this isn't a new conversation. Architects, whether famous or not, have been doing this for centuries. Living in Gin pointed out that Frank Lloyd Wright designed the Usonian houses. They were developed in the 30s, in a time of economic depression, as means for the common person to afford a new home. Well, we're in economic depression now, and as the architectural industry and housing markets struggle, my guess is that these plans benefit both the studios and the common person alike.

LTL, nArchitects, along with the Hometta studios, at one point probably designed these homes for a singular client. But once the plans are sold to a masses, they become market products. I don't see much difference in this process versus the cookie-cutter Colonials and Capes other than style. While most of us on Archinect would agree that the Hometta plans are of a higher quality than the McMansions we see across American suburbs, design is subjective, and it is ultimately up to client preference.

Generally, making these high-design plans available to the masses is good, as it provides more choices for the American home buyer. But as I see it, it should be considered an architectural product, not an architectural masterpiece.

The Hometta site and this discussion ties in with the discussion of the Freegreen competition nicely - It's as if Hometta is for the Dwell readers, offering design by established (or at least well connected) architects and Freegreen is aiming for the Better Homes and Gardens set, using everyone's favorite word "free." Of course most of the designs look the same.