Trend Alert: Living in a Cargo Container

I think of myself as the a modernist. I shop at Ikea, I drive a Mini Cooper and a Vespa scooter and I like pop art from Warhol to Close. While I love living in Brooklyn, my 1905 brownstone apartment never quite fit my personality. The doors are a little slanted the windows don't close all the way and the floor creaks like a 100 year old floor should. But moderists like smooth lines and sharp angles, which are hard to find in an old building.

A few years back I came across a magazine targeted at people like myself called Dwell and it featured a new style home called the Prefab. Now this isn't the Prefab Sears homes from the 1920's. They are cargo containers stacked, cut apart and reassembled into homes. Yes, you heard me right. The same TEU containers that are "homes" for lettuce shipping from China can now be your home with a little added flair.

The beauty of these prefabs is that they are cheap. A 2000 sq ft home could run in the area of $75,000, which leaves plenty extra to spend on a nice piece of land along the ocean. The one I am eyeing up is designed in Austria and can be assembled by a team of 10 in three weeks. They are highly customizable and a lot of fun to look at. Talk about taking your work home with you.