Shipping container architecture - eight of the best
From restaurants and offices to a ferry port and pop-up shopping mall, we choose some of the best buildings that use reclaimed shipping containers in their design
Just like every creative industry, architecture has its trends, and one of the big ones over the last few years has been the use of reclaimed objects and materials, particularly shipping containers, which lend themselves particularly well to architecture and interior design. These industrial-looking metal boxes, with their distinctive corrugated surfaces, can be used to create a striking look, but they are also cost-effective and practical when it comes of making buildings. Reasonably cheap, strong, and a good size for a small-ish room, shipping containers work perfectly as a prefabricated, modular building block - and they are designed to be lifted into place by crane, making contraction on site a synch.
Here are some of our favourite projects where shipping containers have been used to striking effect.
The Wahaca South Bank Experiment
Location: London
Design: Softroom
Designed by British architecture practice Softroom and built from eight recycled shipping containers arranged on two overhanging levels, this Mexican restaurant was originally meant to occupy its position on the south bank of the River Thames temporarily. But nearly two years on (it opened in 2012) it's still adding a welcome splash of colour to the concrete backdrop of the Royal Festival Hall.
The brief for Softroom was to design a 'transportable' restaurant made entirely of shipping containers, a difficult brief, according to the architects: 'A particular challenge for Softroom was working with such a fixed building element as a shipping container while ensuring that the vibrancy and warmth of the Wahaca brand was retained,' they say.
The containers were opened up via a series of walkways, windows and terraces to ensure as much natural light as possible gets into the building. Each container has also been painted in one of several vibrant colours chosen to evoke the character of typical street scenes in Mexico. Inside, the containers have been given their own distinct fell with bespoke lighting and a mix of new and reclaimed furniture.
