Tedd Benson has “only a small ambition,” he told assembled guests at the grand opening of his Unity Homes factory in Keene, N.H., in 2018. “We intend to change the building industry. Dramatically.”
Benson’s roots as a builder go back to the 1970s, when he helped to kick-start the timber-framing revival in the U.S. with his classic book, Building the Timber Frame House. But the vision has evolved over the years, and Benson’s current venture, Unity Homes, is about much more than honing a chisel.
In July 2018, JLC toured Unity’s factory in Keene, N.H. What we saw was a state-of-the-art computerized and automated facility where comprehensive CAD plans are turned into complete high-performance custom home packages that the company’s trained crews can erect on site in a matter of days.
In December, we went on site in Brewster, Mass., to see a crew set one of Unity’s house packages. What follows is a look at both ends of the process: the precise factory fabrication of house components in the Keene facility, and the quick erection of the home on site in the field.
The company’s goals are ambitious and broad: building in a few weeks homes that can last for hundreds of years; precisely controlling fabrication to eliminate construction defects completely; and creating a process that can scale up to become standard practice throughout the nation. Can they do it? Read on.
Read Next >> Touring the Unity Homes Factory Floor
