mincasa – a minimal blog for minimal houses

Credits: Markku Hedman, Professor, Architect SAFA – http://www.a-mh.fi/

Summer-Container is a movable timber-framed holiday cabin, operating on the matchbox principle. The purpose of the project was to study temporary dwelling, the relationship of building with nature and adaptability and varied use of a small leisure home. The project has also studied the uses of domestic lumber and plywood products and glued structural joints.

Summer-Container is a small building with an ephemeral and unsettled spirit. It reflects contemporary social, environmental and cultural reality and it meets the needs of a present-day individual inhabitant. In addition this project is utilised to examine the characteristics of sustainable development in housing design and construction. At the same time Summer-Container is deeply rooted into the history of Finnish architecture. It is a reinterpretation of a conventional Finnish holiday cabin. It makes use of materials typically utilized in industry and transforms them into a restful summer-home. It also creates a variable structure, which is able to accommodate itself into a traditional Finnish countryside or forest.

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Small scale housing forms what one could call the undergrowth of dwelling from which thoughts about the world are to germinate. One of the most important tasks for these pioneer species of architecture is to create possibilities for a balanced and interactive relationship between man and nature. It requires discarding anthropocentric thinking and understanding the inherent value of nature itself. It also means renewing the concept of time in architecture. Small-scale housing projects are typically characterized by a holistic approach and an inbuilt ephemeral quality.

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