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The upper floors of DFAB HOUSE at night, a faceted translucent facade glowing above a glazed storey
Photo: NCCR Digital Fabrication

DFAB HOUSE

NEST, Dübendorf, Switzerland · 2018 · Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich

Cooperating robots assembled the six timber modules of the house's two upper floors from 487 beams.

Spatial Timber Assemblies developed a robot-based fabrication process for timber frame modules, building on existing timber-framing methods and adding the robot's ability to produce parts just in time and place them precisely in space. Six modules were prefabricated at the Robotic Fabrication Laboratory, ETH Zurich, then taken by lorry to the DFAB HOUSE site on the NEST building in Dübendorf, where they form a two-storey residential unit.

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