Front page · Cosy Homes
Built in a shed, stacked like toy bricks: the house factory with a heart
Hattie Hearth’s factory makes whole houses out of timber, then a big crane puts them together on the street. And at the end, the family gets the keys.
Families write in for a home: a cottage for a gap in a terrace, a bungalow with a ramp for Grandad, a tall thin townhouse, a tiny house on wheels, a round eco home or a whole block of flats. Every one starts with its front wall, built flat on the jig. The nail bridge runs along it and you tap as it passes over each stud: thunk-thunk. Then hold to blow hemp into each gap, and let go right at the top.
The sheathing board goes on, and you drag the big saw round the dashed line to cut out the windows (round ones for the eco home, an arch for the tiny house). The windows drop in, the overhead crane stands the wall up in its module, and off it goes on the lorry.
On the plot, the big crane lifts each module off its lorry, swinging on the rope. Line it up with its outline and lower it gently: too wobbly and it bonks and lifts back up. Bolt it down and the roof goes on. Swipe on the solar tiles row by row (or sow the eco home’s green roof), paint the front door the colour the family asked for, and hand over the keys at dusk. The door opens, the lights come on room by room, and the house stays on the street.
