Cost Effective Building

Cost Effective Building
Visitors also repeatedly encounter topics such as DIY, locally sourced materials, simple structures and prefabrication – the same themes we cover in this edition of DETAIL on cost-effective building. Of course, affordable housing is paramount: Heide Wessely’s article in the Discussion section looks into why it is so expensive in Germany, while in Technology, Rainer Hofmann gives his insight into erecting it economically by describing four of his own projects. In our Documentation section we present a shelter for the homeless made of concrete sandwich panels, a primary school in Japan employing standardised timber, and a studio in London that combines especially low-priced materials.