A modern movement is creating efficient designs that rely on natural light, ventilation and landscaping.
ALLISON ARIEFF wrote the book “Prefab” in 2002, chronicling the history of prefabricated houses and mapping the possible future of environmentally responsible modular home design and fabrication.
“When I told people what I was doing, they giggled,” says Arieff, one of the founders of Dwell and formerly the magazine’s editor. “Like, why would anybody write a book on this really mundane ugly architecture?”
Since then, the laughable increasingly has become laudable. On Saturday, Arieff will lead prefab designers Michelle Kaufmann, Jennifer Siegal and Rocio Romero in a panel discussion titled “The Four Women of Prefab” during the annual CA Boom show in Santa Monica.
Here, Arieff shares her opinions about the contemporary design movement she dubs “modern prefab”:
Kit houses have been around since Sears Roebuck started selling them 100 years ago, and the Eames House in Pacific Palisades was b…
