container homes – Shanghai Metal Corporation

More Than a Radiator

The world of interior design is border-less and what is commonly considered a normal domestic heat exchanger can become a real piece of art. As you have certainly figured out, today we will talk about metal radiators: not common radiators but design radiators!

Here is a selection for you.

CIUSSAI (concept & design Stefano Ragaini e Giorgio Di Tullio) It is a long tube radiator. Depending on the customer’s needs and creativity, the uniqueness of this radiator is that it is “on the move” and for this reason it can take different forms.

SCALETTA (desing Elisa Giovannoni). This stair-radiator does not require a complex installation and can then be easily moved from a room to another.

salone_bagno-27-650x487 — From leonardo.tv

CALORISFERO by Deltacalor. This radiator is made of wood and steel and its very particular design makes it more similar to a piece of art than a radiator.

MIRROR (design Fabio Berti) No mistakes! What you see in the picture below is not a simple mirror but a mirror-radiator. It can be placed wherever it better fits the client’s needs: from the bathroom to the entrance hall for a last-minute check before leaving home.

ARCHIBALD by Runtal and MONTE CARLO from Designer Radiators. Nothing better than towel warmer after a shower. Even better if it is a design radiator.

chic-radiator-runtal-archibald-2 — From ideare-casa.com

designer-radiators-monte-carlo-towel-warmer — From trendir.com

What about you? What design radiator do you like the most? Do not forget that Shanghai Metal Corporation provides you with a great selection of metals such as aluminum, copper, steel and so on. Great quality and competitive prices are our guidelines in order to satisfy clients from all over the world. Visit our website to learn more about our business and products and do not hesitate to contact us.

Scan the QR code below and stay informed about our latest updates:

Stefano // SMC Editor

The coolest student-dorm is made of CONTAINERS!

No doubts! The coolest dormitory of all time is located in Johannesburg, South Africa. Why this student-dorm is so unique? Because is made from old silos and shipping containers! The project was recently realized by the full service management company Citiq Property Services (PTY) Ltd. Here is how the company displayed this amazing idea.

“Citiq recently purchased two sets of the disused grain silos in Newtown, Johannesburg. Through creative design and leading edge architecture, the plans are to develop energy-efficient buildings that are both contemporary in design and contribute to the urban regeneration of Newtown. Conversion of Mill Junction, the first set of silos, to student accommodation started at the beginning of 2013 and was completed in early 2014, just in time for the new student intake.”

(from citiqproperty.co.za)

Mill-Junction-07 — from http://www.domusweb.it/en

As it was stated by DomusWeb website, the five silos used to build the dormitory were abandoned and grain was once stored there. Recycled containers were then placed, one on top of the other or one next to the other, both on the side and on top of the five silos. The dormitory can today host about 400 students enrolled in different school or universities thanks to the strategic location of the dormitory. This is for sure one of the most extraordinary example of how shipping containers can be used in a very fashionable way for a worthy purpose.

If you wonder how a single/double room looks like FastCoexist website provides you with the answer! How you can see from the pictures below, living in a container house/room looks exactly the same of sleeping in a ‘tradition’ house.

Not only! This amazing dorm partially made from recycled shipping containers offers numerous common areas to students such as game and computer rooms, libraries, gym and kitchens, and even a climbing wall!!

Untitled design (2) — from http://www.fastcoexist.com/

Wondering container-house might be the perfect solution for you and your family? Shanghai Metal Corporation provides you with a great selection of container houses. Visit our website and do not hesitate to contact us.

Scan the QR code below and stay informed about our latest updates:

Stefano// SMC Editor

The Quik House Container

Adam Kalkin is ‘an artist, an architect and many other things’. Among these other things Kalkin is also the creator of a project called Quik House. By assembling recycled shipping containers, this architect has developed the idea of a prefabricated kit house.

Untitled design — from http://www.prefabs.com and http://www.quik-build.com

Here is what Kalkin has stated about his mission when interviewed by the CNN.

I use architecture as a vehicle for experimentation and discovering. The container is a proper skill object. When you recontextualize It, putting it in a residential context-use it for architecture proper, you both destroy the original context and create a new context. This is a form of upcycling […]. You get a beautiful dialogue from the old and the new and between one set of ideas and another and it creates a certain kind of vitality which really resonates with me.

adam-kalkin-container-house-3 — from http://www.blessthisstuff.com

4b5a2dfc82ad5 — from http://www.blessthisstuff.com

The project seems to meet three main expectations of today’s market. First, the coast. The price of the Quik House is very low compared to traditional houses. According to the Quik House website the estimated finishing cost for a basic Quik House composed by 6 modified shipping containers is around $184,000 (plus shipping). Second, a modern and unique design. For instance, customers could ask for local graffiti artists to decorate their new house. Third, eco-friendship. The use of second hand containers guarantees the involvement of Kalkin’s company in the recycling process which has a very positive impact on environment protection.

Shanghai Metal Corporation provides you with a great selection of container houses. Visit our website and do not hesitate to contact us.

Scan the QR code below and stay informed about our latest updates:

Stefano// SMC Editor

Container Homes – The Illegal Saviors of Economies And the Environment

The ports of many import-driven countries including the USA are filled with used shipping containers that are never shipped back to their original destinations. Therefore considering the well-being of the environment, getting new ways of use for them is crucial. Building affordable homes for many families is the best option, but how to influence the local decision makers to offer building permits.

The valuable resources of used shipping containers will remain as an unused asset if the decision makers do not allow the installation of shipping container houses. The roots of the problem are not on the operational level, in other words, in the daily application and inspection processes. In many countries there are protocols on how large, what colour or which material the houses in a specific suburb should be made of. The problem is that the standards do not say much about special building materials, let alone shipping containers.

The inspectors can only follow the protocol, that’s a fact. Therefore people should work on influencing the upper level authorities, unions and city councils.

Social media offers great tools for that. It is important that people keep on writing blogs about the benefits of shipping container architecture. It is also equally important to share other people’s work on social media. The optimum use of Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, WordPress etc. enables the maximum reach of one’s work. Maximum reach implies that the content will eventually reach the decision makers or the people who influence them. Moreover, as we already analyzed in our former article, this industry develops really slowly, so all the counter measures should be designed for a long run.

Besides quality, quantity also counts. The decision makers also suffer from bounded rationality. Instead of only few experts, by social media they can be influences of thousands of experts, those who want to build affordable homes and to help to save the environment and the economy. Even though it sounds like a long shot but it’s still an implementable way.

Shanghai Metal Corporation also contributes to this good cause by creating content related to container architecture and sharing others’ work. SMC is a pioneer in providing shipping containers and container buildings for many countries. You can also join our social media communities.

Tuomas P. // SMC Editor

Pictures and more reading in: Containerist, Biz Journals, Wikipedia, Baidu Image, Baco Enterprises

Container Houses – Hobbits in the Mordor of Architecture

Why do people want to build their homes out of shipping containers? Because of the benefits one can gain from containers and the promises related to successful shipping container architecture. Container houses indeed have many benefits that are superior compared to more conventional construction material. Still, there are numerous examples of how container house projects fail. Failure and challenges make some people question containers’ position as a reliable building material. Here we want to discuss some of that criticism.

Modularity, eco-friendliness and excellent availability are indeed some of the many benefits of shipping containers. The ports of many import driven countries including the US have hundreds of thousands of containers that are never shipped back to their original destination. Therefore it is logical and environmentally friendly to find ways to reuse these building blocks. However like any building material, containers also need to be processed.

Shipping containers should not be used in the condition that they are when first found in the docks. They have taken hits and transported goods with unknown origin. They might have shipped contaminants and they floors might be in bad condition. Refurbishing the containers thoroughly is as important as with any construction material.

Because of the numerous operations including flooring, plumbing, drywall etc., container house projects might become as expensive as ordinary building projects. Thereby it is an recommended option to buy prefabricated container homes from a reliable provider. For instance Shanghai Metal Corporation manufactures and ships numerous prefabricated homes each year to many countries.

Sometimes container homes get excessive critics. Some people say container homes are not suitable for areas that are either really cold or really hot. This is not true. There is even a huge inhabitable container house complex in Antarctica! In hot conditions the container houses can be built to direct the flow of air inside creating a natural ventilation and thus saving costs. Such examples include the container ship terminal in Seville and this container house created by Chinese university students.

Some people say container houses are not bullet proof. It’s true that the light steel walls won’t stop a .38 Magnum but it will stop dynamite. That’s something, say, a wood house can’t do. Moreover container houses are hurricane and earthquake resistant. Isn’t that more important?

The thing is that the shipping container architecture industry is really young and under development. In his book, Why A Students Work for C Students And Why C Students Work for the Government, a successful entrepreneur and author Robert Kiyosaki mentions that the construction industry is the slowest industry in adapting new concepts. He says that the time gap between when a new idea is proposed and its adoption is 60 years in the construction industry.

People have built wood houses for ages, and learned from their mistakes. That’s why wood houses don’t have that much criticism anymore. The container house patent was filed in 1987. Therefore the expected time for flawless container architecture should be around the year 2047. Container housing needs just more time to develop – from hobbits to heroes. Luckily, the signs refer to faster development than 60 years.

As in any construction industry it is important to do the right things. It is also important to do the things right. That’s what Shanghai Metal Corporation does by specializing in building container houses according to customers’ specification. A sketch of your dream house drawn with Google’s Sketch Up is what we need hear to realize your dreams. You may contact us first by this form. See our service description through this link. Check also our social media sites for future updates.

Tuomas P. // SMC Editor

Pictures and more reading: Wikipedia, Survivopedia, Homedit, Apartment Therapy, Container Alliance, Arch Daily, Jets on Green, Tin Can Cabin, Baidu Image

Container Houses – Affordable Homes And A Lot More

As we all know, building a home out of shipping containers is cheaper and faster than conventionally built homes with same dimensions. Buying a prefabricated container home makes it even easier for average consumer since the majority of the construction is made off-site. Container homes are definitely becoming the mainstream of affordable housing, but since almost anything can be built out of these steel Lego blocks, why should one settle only for getting a living space?

The simplest container living space can of course be done by using a one single container. There are numerous examples of these container micro homes that are also presented in our articles. People wanting to build larger homes use to spend more money by hiring an architect agency to make them do the drawings for a container house manufacturer. Today thanks to Google, we can avoid those service costs by using Google’s Sketch Up program to make them ourselves. That money can be spent perhaps for a container garage, sauna or even a swimming pool.

Container swimming pool could be a nice DIY project. Stefan Beese, An experimental architect set us an example by turning his New Orlean’s backyard into a luxurious swimming zone. He used a 30 cubic shipping container, added some pumps, filters, linings and did all the necessary operations. He only used about $5,000 to $7,000 to do that. You can read his whole story through this link.

Saunas are a necessities in some countries. For example in Nordic countries a saunaless house will most likely not get sold. For now the container sauna market is not that large and there are only a few suppliers of prefabricated container sauna manufacturers. One of them is Canadian Castor whose 8 ft sauna containers have a really high-end price tag of $ 41,000.

Luckily shipping container houses are modular and flexible in every way. They can be shipped and built in relatively short time frames. They can also be easily adjoined to existing buildings. Therefore for consumers it could be a reasonable option to buy a custom manufactured container house and save pools, saunas etc. later as DIY projects.

In Shanghai Metal Corporation we custom-manufacture container houses according to customers’ requirements. We also offer various indoor kits that you can see on our web page. We also sell various kinds of shipping containers worldwide. If you have questions related product categories, you can send your questions through this form. We are also active on these social media platforms. Follow us to get future updates.

Tuomas P. // SMC Editor

Pictures and original articles: Gizmag, Nola, my-container.co.uk, Inhabitat, Viralnova

The Many Architectural Applications of Shipping Containers vol.5

Our fifth chapter on shipping containers’ architectural applications will discuss examples of how and why they are an excellent choice for creating affordable and sustainable schools and student homes. It might be that even this generation of students will get familiar at least one of them.

Using shipping containers as temporal school houses has at least two rationales. The first reason is that especially old wooden school buildings are likely to have mold issues that may cause severe health risks. For example an article of a Finnish science magazine Tiede states that every second school in Finland has mold issues (source). Students are therefore either forced to stay in their mold school or move to another school. Container schools could be installed in relatively short time and with relatively low costs.

The second reason can be studied from Samsung. In 2012, the South Korean electronics chaebol established a shipping container school in the South African village of Phomolong as a part of its corporate-social responsibility program. The school offers its 21 students premium education facilities with solar powered electricity system and notebooks, an Internet connection and Samsung Galaxy tablets. (source)

The lack of affordable student homes creates another application for shipping containers. For instance in Finland there is a high demand for student homes as the number of available apartments in student villages is getting lower. Students are now forced to pay a very high monthly rent. Some students have to pay even over 800 euros of monthly rent. According to a survey conducted by the Finnish periodical Iltalehti, 40 percent of the thousand respondents said that their funds are really low due to expensive rents. They are now designing economical student homes, made of containers.

Harri Nordling, a Finnish container home designer, has designed beautiful container student homes. The container homes can also be expanded to multi-storeyed blocks of flats. This sort of solution has already been applied in Sweden. Container homes are easy to build. They are also low-cost and environmentally friendly.

So many deficits in housing can nowadays be solved with shipping containers. Therefore we offer a large variety of shipping containers in Shanghai Metal Corporation. We also offer prefabricated container building solutions. Please visit our web pages for detailed descriptions. Check also our social media sites.

Tuomas P. // SMC Editor

Pictures and original articles: Tiede magazine, Cnet, The Volt Report,Arch Daily, Wintech Modular Buildings, Lion Containers, Design Boom, Iltalehti.fi, Hansacontainers.com

Continue to chapter 6.

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The Many Architectural Applications of Shipping Containers vol. 1

There are many ways how to use shipping containers to create affordable and sufficient real estate for housing or business use. In these series of blogs we will briefly discuss some of them. The volume one takes you to container homes, hotels, and retail outlets.

The benefits of container homes have been recognized worldwide. For instance, in Finland, container housing is becoming a great solution for offering affordable student homes.

One of the benefits of shipping containers is their modularity. Containers are like Lego blocks. You can pile them up and thereby even create a multiple floor or a multiple wing mansion. Still, sometimes only one container is enough for building a home.

A container hotel system is a new trend to take the hotel business closer to a specific clientele. Besides, the hotel solutions are made for luxury consumers offering them a wonderful experience. For example an UK company Snoozebox offers portable hotel services to any location or any events. The portable lodge has 40-400 rooms and each room has a flat screen and a Wifi.

Conventional retailing includes setting up a store in a fixed location and paying the rent for the use of the real estate. Modern retailing on the other hand, is mobile, meaning that instead of waiting for the customers to come to you, you will be able to easily relocate your business closer to your customers. This simple procedure is going mainstream and it can only be done with shipping containers.

If one already has an online retail business, it can be easily expanded offline with shipping containers and create a combined retail infrastructure that has all the advantages of both online and offline retailing.

Shanghai Metal Corporation sells shipping containers internationally. We also make prefabricated shipping container housing and office solutions. Please visit our website on containers and container buildings for detailed descriptions. Follow us also on these social media platforms.

Tuomas P. // SMC Editor

Sources: See our articles on container homes, hotels, and retail outlets.

Continue to chapter 2

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Shakespeare Reborn in Container Theaters

We cannot all be masters, nor all masters cannot be truly follow’d. –a Quotation from Shakespeare’s Othello

The modularity of shipping containers enables creative architects to design beautiful container homes and hotels. Open top containers can be turned into swimming pools. Open side containers can become excellent theaters.

In 2013 a local architecture studio O+A designed the architectural setting of the 20th Over het IJ Festival and transformed Amsterdam’s shipyard into a huge restaurant area with theatrical stages. The building of the “container city” took four days, and another two days to take down, lasting only two weeks in between.

Shipping containers theaters have also been used in Miami. In 2012, the actors of Microteatro por Dinero performed in 15 minute short dramas for 15 people six times a night in a shipping container. The concept of “por dinero performance” (in English for money) has its roots in Madrid where local actors turned an old bordello into a commercial mini theater and spread the word in social media.

Besides drama, shipping containers have also been used as movie theaters. Container mini theaters showed short films in New York in 2011. The event was a part of USA Network’s Character Project and it also was supported by the director of the Alien Saga, Ridley Scott. Audience was placed in 18-seat air conditioned screening pods to watch the shorts. The tour also took place in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Chicago.

It is yet unclear when does this “Broadway in a box” concept spread globally and go mainstream. Still, because of these events, mobile mini theaters will gain popularity in cinema and drama industries.

Whenever there is a need for shipping containers, one should always contact Shanghai Metal Corporation. Our wide collection of shipping containers can help companies to pack great entertainment in a box. For more information about our shipping containers, please visit our website (http://www.smccontainer.com). Please also follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. Try also our new mobile application by scanning the QR code below.

Tuomas P. // SMC Editor

Pictures and original articles: WLRN, N-punto, Broadway World, Gizmag, Wired, Miami New Times, Inhabitat, Oplusa.nl

Containers – The New Political Soapbox

The traditional soapbox has been proved outmoded this month – the must-have accessory for the modern politician in Pakistan seems to be the shipping container.

According to the BBC, even Imran Khan is said to have spent more than $120,000 (£70,000) on one. “These shipping containers that you have placed on all four sides are not enough to stop this ocean of people!” declared cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan at a rally on Tuesday night. He was addressing Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

Originally, the Pakistani government strategically placed a number of shipping containers near political institutions, ready to be placed as a blockade for potential protesters. But party workers have discovered that containers make excellent stages for rallies, and they are now an indispensable item for any big political event.

To the endless interest of Pakistan’s media, they can also be converted into mobile homes. In January last year, ul-Qadri held a four-day sit-in in Islamabad. While his supporters were out on the street, he slept inside his customised container, fitted with heating and a bathroom.

It was later reported that Khan’s party had had a container converted at a cost of some 12.5m Pakistani rupees ($124,000; £75,000). It is equipped with meeting facilities, a bathroom, and a nifty spiral staircase leading to the roof – and is supposedly bomb-proof. See our previous articles regarding container homes and their increased popularity in the USA and Europe.

Shanghai Metal manufactures shipping containers. We are the leading manufacturer and supplier in China. From the acquisition of raw materials, packaging and exportation, SMC ensures only the best quality of products. By assigning professional experts at every stage of production, we ensure continuous support in our worldwide business. To find out more, please visit our website, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Or you could try our new mobile app by scanning our QR code.

You can also read more articles by our team at SMC:

Move Along Airplanes – Submarines Overtake Travel

Thor’s Hammer: The Science

Shipping Container City – Shanghai Immigrant’s Homes

Can You Do A 360 Degree Loop On A Swing Set?

Become Bullet Proof …Using Water

Counterfeit Money Cases

LEGO Lands On British Shores

Innovative Uses of Soap

Air Quality – What Can Be Done?

Team Building Exercises – A New Spin

How Much Petrol Costs Internationally