Toronto, Ontario
Lloyd Alter, licensed architect and Architecture & Design Editor for the popular, award-winning site TreeHugger, has written a very favourable review following his walk through the Cube at the 2010 National Home Show in Toronto last week. TreeHugger is the leading media outlet dedicated to driving sustainability mainstream, “helping the masses get hooked on sustainability,” as they put it, and enjoying over a million unique visitors. Following are some snips of what Lloyd had to say… see the whole review here.
“A lot of lessons have been learned over the last decade as architects and manufacturers try to make modern green prefab affordable and accessible to a wider audience. A new entry into the market is Challenger, a modern architect-designed line of houses from Manitoba, Canada’s Conquest Manufacturing…
By way of background, prior to coming to TreeHugger I spend a number of years trying to introduce modern modular to the Canadian marketplace, and did just about everything wrong. Looking at the Challenger line, I think that they have done just about everything right…
Look at any old farmhouse from the last century and you will find most are tight, square, two storey boxes; it minimizes surface area and, since heat rises, they tend to be easier to heat. The Cube is a tight, efficient 1056 square foot two bedroom unit with one bath on the second floor… But the more interesting thing about its design is the floor plate size and the number of modules. The module size is set by transport regulations; where I was building, you could build a unit of up to 16 feet wide by 62 feet long. The conventional wisdom was that you got the best economy by maximizing the size of the module, but you were always limited by that maximum width…
The Cube has a floor plate of 21′-6 by 27′, giving a module size of 10′-9″ by 27′; this is narrow enough that it can go down the road without special escort and without expensive permits at every state or provincial border. At 27′ long, two can go on a trailer, further reducing transport costs. The crane needed to lift a 15,000 pound module of that size is relatively cheap; the unit appears to be designed for transportation and installation efficiency…
Energy efficiency features include a white EPDM rubber roof membrane (sloped slightly to allow for rain water capture), roughed-in conduit for optional rooftop solar panel installation, R50 ceiling insulation, double-wall construction with R30+ Roxul Batt insulation, and tri-pane argon-filled metal-clad windows by Jeldwen. Interior lifestyle amenities include sustainable bamboo flooring, recessed LED lighting, custom eco-wood cabinetry with built-in closet organizers throughout the home, an open-tread stairway to the upper level, a laundry chute from 2nd floor to a lower level laundry room, and an alcohol-burning fireplace…
In summary, the Cube is a mix of intelligent architectural design and great modular engineering, that delivers a lot of green, energy saving design at a great price.”
(Photos by Lloyd Alter)