Chapter 4, the final chapter of The Techbuilt Manual. Put the finishing touches on the house and move in!
More interesting content is in the works, but for more Techbuilt material, please checkout our Instagram feed @techbuilthouse.
Chapter 4 – It’s Your Dream – Now Live In It. (1.6Mb PDF)
If you search for information on Carl Koch, you will see that he has an entry on sites that tell the story of the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program (MFAA), also known as the Monuments Men. While there is solid evidence that Koch was trying to get in the program, I have not found anything to indicate that he served in any capacity in the MFAA.
It seems that the program pulled mostly from qualified personnel in the US Army but in 1944-45 they extended it with an effort to bring on members from the US Navy. At the time, Lt. Carl Koch was stationed in Hollywood, Florida and was actively corresponding with his contacts at Harvard who were part of the selection committee for the program. He was certainly qualified and was recommended for the MFAA by multiple people even being first on one of the lists submitted.
This information is all available through Fold3, the military records offshoot of Ancestry.com. Among the documents related to Koch’s MFAA application is his resume. This is significant for two reasons. The first is that it is typed on Planning & Building Associates letterhead. (Maybe a topic for a future post). The second is that it is the only record I have seen that clearly states what Koch’s work experience was prior to his development of Conantum and then Techbuilt Inc.. This type of information is found in an architect’s AIA application for membership and/or fellowship. However, Carl Koch’s AIA records, along with many others, were damaged in storage and lost.
Chapter 3: Your Dream Takes the Techbuilt Shape (7.7Mb PDF) — Chapter 4, coming soon.
We are on Instagram (@techbuilthouse) and will post additional images and ephemera there.
It has been a while, but there will be new content up soon. Two more chapters of the Techbuilt Manual and some Carl Koch history. We are (finally) on Instagram (@techbuilthouse) and will post images and ephemera there.
The Techbuilt Manual Your Dream vs the Cold Dollar (5.3Mb PDF) Next Chapter…Your Dream Takes the Techbuilt Shape
The first chapter of The Techbuilt Manual introduces the potential buyer to the basics of buying a new home and to the Techbuilt Idea. The services if Techbuilt Inc are also outlined and include this great advice, “Techbuilt does not intend to go into the way of handling hammer and saw, so to speak. If the family does not have the ability, it is strongly urged that they do not build their own house”.
The Techbuilt Manual – Your Dream (4.6Mb PDF) Next up…Your Dream Against the Cold Dollar
In 1953, Techbuilt Inc put together The Techbuilt Manual in preparation for the 1954 Building Your Home show in New York City. It was intended to introduce potential clients to the way that the company worked and how to approach becoming a Techbuilt homeowner. As the front matter states, below, the intention was to develop this book into something more substantial.
I have not found any indication that a second edition was produced nor have I come across another copy of this edition. As you can see in the cover image above, this copy came from materials belonging to Robert Bacon, the source of many Techbuilt treasures you can see on the web. I plan to post the Manual chapter by chapter over the next few weeks with this first installment being the preface. This preface contains information about the origins of Techbuilt that I haven’t seen elsewhere. The role of Leon Lipshutz is especially interesting and I was inspired to finally get these posts up after some recent correspondence with his son. I hope you enjoy these posts and, if you have never seen them, I cannot wait for you to see the many wonderful illustrations that Mary MacLennan created for this book!
The Techbuilt Manual – The Plan (1.7Mb PDF) Next up…Your Dream
The Ford Foundation’s TV Radio Workshop show Excursion featured the Techbuilt House in its broadcast on February 14, 1954. The show documented (and dramatized) the design and construction process of one of the first Techbuilts. Below is the re-airing of the show in the Workshop’s Omnibus program.
The timing of this broadcast coincided with the upcoming Building Your Home expo in New York City, which featured a Techbuilt constructed inside the 71st Regiment Armory on Park Avenue. This is also the time when the houses started showing up in magazine articles and newspaper features. Early adopters of the Techbuilt franchise in St. Louis and Detroit were able to capture the moment and took out ads that connected the TV show with the developments and model homes they were in the process of building.
Huge thanks to our Associate Editor, Scott, for tracking this video down and getting it released in a digital format. (The story of how he did that will be featured later either as an addition to this post or a post of its own.)
Custom Techbuilts were available to buyers since the early days of the company. For the most part this involved a custom configuration of the 4 foot panels, altering the width or length of a house, but generally keeping with the rectangular shape. However, the late 1960s and early 1970s saw several new forms of Techbuilt appear. Some of these appear to be one-off custom designs that were then offered as a standard package. One of these is the Shikoku.
The Shikoku featured large open spaces with the long elevations being mostly glass. A walled garden was created to screen the house from the street. This feature allowed for the deep soak tub in the bathroom having a view to the garden, seen in the image above.
The Shikoku model came during a time when Techbuilt was part of the Kanaje Corporation of New York which had acquired Techbuilt Inc from Federal Paper Board in 1972. Kanaje included a Shikoku model in their Redwoods East development along with some other Techbuilts.
We have only been able to locate the one Shikoku model built in Redwoods East, though it has been modified and no longer has the walled garden. Any information regarding others of this model would be appreciated.
Shikoku images are from a Techbuilt catalog, circa 1973, from the collection of Jeff Adkisson.
Redwoods East advertisement is from The Journal News, White Plains, NY. June 22, 1973.
The Techbuilt House 