Structural Insulated Panels: tracking the evolution of the 21st century building system

Ancient Egyptians employed mud bricks for their homes and masonry for their grandest buildings. During the industrial revolution, cast iron rose to prominence and later paved the way for steel. From the 1950’s, concrete joined hands with Brutalism to shape multiple cities.

And then there is the 21st century building system, the Structural Insulated Panel (SIP)– a high performance composite material defined by the US-based Structural Insulated Panel Association (SIPA) as consisting of “an insulating foam core sandwiched between two structural facings, typically oriented strand board (OSB)”. Designed for residential and lighter forms of commercial construction, SIPs are a symptom of today’s AEC industry, where engineered architecture is king....

...Although SIPs continue to gain momentum today as a preferred ‘green’ building system, structural panels were first developed over 80 years ago when the US government-established Forest Products Laboratory (FPL) constructed the first SIP home in Madison, Wisconsin in 1935....

...Frank Lloyd Wright also had a hand to play in the evolution of the first SIP. Known for pioneering Usonian Architecture, the famed “simplicity and repose” architect had set out to create a panel with three layers of plywood, two layers of tarpaper, and no insulation that he believed would work well with the construction of highly cost-effective homes. Although the exclusion of insulation ultimately determined the demise of the Wright-type SIP, which failed to gain popularity and never made it into large-scale production, his work spurred on his student, Alden B. Dow, to redevelop the panel with an insulated core....


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Ken Notes: Great read and one of my favorite building systems... Note the Wisconsin roots....