Shipping containers have become so much more than transport units over the last few years, with businesses turning them into pop-up coffee shops, food halls and, even, indoor gardens. The latest trend sees people making a more permanent use of shipping containers – transforming them into their homes.
One place where residents are moving into shipping container houses is Oklahoma City in America, with Allford Hall Monaghan Morris (AHMM) creating a scheme of houses in a development called Squirrel Park.
Sixteen steel shipping containers were brought to the site to create four houses on a budget of $1.1 million (£854,540), Dezeen revealed.
The developer client plans to live in one of the two-bedroom properties, while the other three will be rented out.
A spokesperson from AHMM said the 2,500 square metre location will help the local community, commenting: “The goal was to take a vacant site that had been a magnet for crime and transform it.”
Two containers will be used to make up the ground floor of the house, while another two will be placed on top, cantilevered three metres over the front to make a porch.
They have been renovated into safe homes to live in, reinforced with steel tubes and welded down to embed in the foundations. There is also a metal stud frame 2.5 cm off the steel frame, which is built within 13 cm of sprayable insulation foam.
Large windows have been installed, the units have been painted white, and a kitchen, bathrooms, living area, and two bedrooms have been fitted.
Squirrel Park is not the first place to transform shipping containers into homes, as there is already a similar site in Flaggstaff, Arizona, providing between 160 and 320 square feet of space for residents, How Stuff Works reported.