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If you’re curious about renovating your own Airstream, “set aside twice as much time as you think it’ll take,” David advises. He worked on it six days a week with the benefit of his own cabinet shop and CNC machine.

Built with a steel frame, the Frost House features panels of styrofoam between aluminum sheets for the exterior walls and styrofoam between plywood for the roof and floors. Bold, primary colors accentuate its geometric form. Shortly after Karen Valentine and Bob Coscarelli purchased the home in 2016, they began to unearth nuggets of information about its pedigree. Their realtor had provided a brochure that identified the prefab as designed by architect Emil Tessin for the now-defunct Alside Homes Corporation based out of Akron, Ohio, which had held a patent for the structure’s aluminum paneling. Their new neighbors provided a stack of Alside Homes sales materials, floor plans of various models, and even a script that had been written for salespeople during home tours. They determined that the Frost House had been a sales model for the company, and that Tessin had been the son of Emil Albert Tessin, the legal guardian of Florence Knoll.

Gaia Off-Grid Shipping Container Home exploded axonometric drawing

The design team sprayed the metal structure’s inner walls with thermal insulation. Then they framed the interior with studs and clad it in spruce plywood.

Drawing inspiration from boat design, Innovative Spaces rebuilt this 1953 trailer from top to bottom with a custom mahogany interior.

As Nicolás Tovo and Teresa Sarmiento of La Base embraced modular design as part of their architectural practice, they noticed that prospective clients were wary of prefabricated construction. So the duo teamed up with Place, an Argentine prefab builder, to make a proof of concept just outside the Patagonian resort town of Bariloche.

Caroline Burke and Riley Haakon updated a 1975 Argosy with know-how gleaned from a prior Airstream renovation.

“We used construction-grade four by fours,” says Riley, referencing the tiled offcuts that make up the trailer’s floor.

Less than 600 Royal Spartanette travel trailers were made—and this one has been rebuilt from top to bottom with a wooden interior and a rooftop solar system.

We’ve gathered 20 of our favorite homes that maintain their midcentury flavor without sacrificing 21st-century modernizations and updates.

There are more than 1,200 window panes in the Kellogg Doolittle House. Each week, Vugrin drove to a local glass shop to pick up finished panes and drop off more patterns—and $5,000 in cash. Only the Doolittles know the total cost of the house; new owner Scott Leonard almost certainly paid millions for it.

Inspiration for the interiors of the house arrived in various guises: Jay Doolittle’s fascination with fossils and John Vugrin’s love of jazz and the way repetitive elements can be used to construct a larger work. “For the pieces I do, I’m more influenced by art, music, and sculpture and not architects,” says Vugrin, pictured here.

Floor Plan of Suite Shed by alsoCAN

Floor plan of Hacienda San Juan Pabellón by Angela and Scott Damman

The floor plan of the home shows its asymmetrical shape and emphasis on indoor-outdoor living.