A growing utopian house of 1960's is now transforming the market in a much more contemporary way for our mobile habitable facilities. Designed by Finnish architect Matti Suuronen in 1968, the 'future' house concept was a true experiment to the utopian architecture of that period.

This UFO-shaped, air space capsule is now sold in the market for €130,000 to place it on your roofs or gardens. The mobile future house is a prefabricated construction-just 8-metres wide, sitting on a white painted metal base. It is completely removable and consists of sixteen modules rounded polyester reinforced fiberglass, bolted together. It consists of a single circular space entirely suitable. The sleeper chairs "Futuro" period, specially designed for the living space, have been preserved. A true collector's item, between object and architecture.

The "Futuro" was designed by Matti Suuronen following a request from a childhood friend who wanted a vacation cottage ready to go to the mountain. Produced in several colors -white, blue, orange, green, yellow, this small prefabricated house perfectly illustrates optimism, technical progress and the utopian architecture of the 1960s.

Its prototype now on display at Centraal Museum Utrecht in the Netherlands, 8 meters in diameter, weighs 400 kg and can accommodate 8 people. In order to mass production, Matti Suuronen reduced to 5 meters in diameter to make it more portable. 

It is at that time presented as a multi-purpose bungalow -private home, commercial place- one hundred copies were produced before the interruption of production following the 1973 oil crisis.

The copy of the "Futuro" that Architecture De Collection offers for sale was acquired by Michel Mollard to house a sandwich of Defense in 1973. His "Resto Bulle" remained there until 1980, start date construction of the mall Four Temps.La house then remained more than 20 years in the country. 

In March 2007, it is transported in pieces in the showroom XXO in Romainville (93). She underwent a complete restoration before being exposed. It is acquired by a passionate collector in 2010, who decided to put on sale in 2016.

A turquoise Futuro House landed at Central Saint Martins in 2015 for an initial year long stay, the Futuro house’s visit to Kings Cross has now been extended until Summer 2017 by popular demand. Painstakingly restored by artist Craig Barnes, this spaceship style, prefabricated fibreglass house is one of only 60 worldwide still in existence today.

In the space of three years, the Futuro has travelled from South Africa to Herefordshire for restoration, and from it’s initial landing post restoration in London at Matt’s Gallery, Mile End to a few miles west at Central Saint Martins, Kings Cross.

Where will it go next however? That is a question even artist and Futuro House owner Craig Barnes doesn’t even know the answer to but would like one! In the meantime, plans for further restoration and development are afoot, and it is hoped that wherever it goes next it will become a space in which people can stay also.

All images © Architecture De Collection

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