Student Project, AHO, 2024
with Eskil Buskov Selmer
In this project we created a principled guide with strategies to transform and extend catalogue houses from the 1960s to gain awareness towards weather and climate adaption, how we can increase their lifespan and comfort of living. In our project we have narrowed the focused on the climate zone Jæren, where wind and rain are dominating weathers. We then proceeded to transform two neighboring houses in Klepp Stasjon, respectively from Block Watne and Hetlandhus.
With the global climate changes, weather conditions will be shifting all around the world. The predictions of the future weather in Norway include a higher
frequency of extreme winds and precipitation, and we also expect an increase in average precipitation per year. Nearly all single-family homes in Jæren are prefab catalogue houses from the manufacturers Hetlandhus and Block-Watne. The increased frequency of extreme weather might have a huge impact on this building stock. These are houses where parts are built in a factory and quickly assembled on site. They are cheap, identical, and built by the thousand. No matter the climate or context these houses are never adapted to their context.
By learning from vernacular building traditions and materiality, we can improve existing structures’ resilience to the extreme weather while also exploring architectural qualities. By combining old and new, we can create spaces with functions and atmospheres which the prefab houses lack in their current state. Our guidebook describes both the pre-fab houses’ qualities and the characteristics of the area of interest, which lays the ground for the rest of our project where we transformed one house each.