Lange Bros Woodworking is tucked in the Thurston Woods neighborhood just off North Sherman Boulevard and West Florist Ave. The nearly century-old family business is known for its high-end interior millwork.
But over the last few years, something new is humming in the shop. RJ Lange — fifth generation in the Lange lineage — has come up with a new twist to home design and construction. It uses precisely-cut plywood components.
“The fork truck comes in with all the plywood. The plywood gets loaded onto the CNC machine. The CNC machine comes back, picks up the plywood, pulls it on and then cuts the individual parts,” Lange says.
The beam system creates extra-thick 12-inch walls, floors and roofs.
Lange’s crew trucks the kit to the construction site, then snaps the plywood components together snuggly without nails or glue. Lange says, think LEGOS. The 6-by-12 inch beams lock together with what’s called a spider jig.
"It essentially has a bunch of little tabs on the corners of each piece so that when you snap on the plywood on all four sides, if the wood shifts to the left or right, the one tab catches it. If it moves up and down, it catches the other,” he says.
Lange says it takes just a few people just a few weeks to frame the structure and fewer than five months to be turn-key ready. He says the material is less expensive than other new construction.
Getting homes on the market faster and for a savings could help ease the housing crisis. Lange calls his company LUSH, which stands for Lange Urban Sustainable Homes.
He subcontracts with Lange Bros to manufacture his plywood home kits.
Lange has projects going in Ozaukee and Washington counties, including an affordable housing project in West Bend. By the end of this year, six LUSH homes will be sprinkled throughout Milwaukee's Thurston Woods neighborhood.
He hopes the 2,000-square-foot or even smaller LUSH homes could be part of Milwaukee’s housing solution.
Easy-to-build, energy-efficient homes
Lange took inspiration from an architect in the Netherlands named Vincent Muller. He's using a similar approach to help address his country's housing crisis.
“The government is saying we need like one million homes. So, if we can do just one small part of these one million homes, I would be happy,” Muller says.
Using CNC-produced plywood components, Muller designed a series of homes near Amsterdam and he has more neighborhood developments in the works.
Muller’s following a model developed in the UK called Wikihouse. It provides free online building designs with the vision of people constructing their own homes.
Muller says initially he expected his houses would be about 25% less expensive than typical Dutch homes, but the savings haven’t been quite that high.
“In the process of building, people decide oh, I have to do the roof myself and then they hire a professional to do that. Then it gets a bit more expensive. So, 20% should be really possible,” Muller says.
Back in Milwaukee, LUSH’s 2,000-square-foot homes cost $275,000 to construct.
Lange says that includes quality components and energy saving features. Over time those features save homeowners money.
But that price tag is out of reach for many buyers according to the Community Development Alliance. It says the average Milwaukeean can afford a home ranging from $120,000 to $150,000.
Yet from where she sits in Washington, D.C. Jenny Schuetz thinks LUSH is worth watching.
She works with a philanthropic organization called Arnold Ventures. It supports research and policy reforms to achieve lasting, scalable change.
Schuetz says LUSH’s approach addresses the high cost of materials and labor.
She hopes more builders follow its lead.
“Trying new things is great, and we should see what works and then hopefully the most effective forms will scale up and get copied elsewhere,” Schuetz says.
Editor's note: This story has been updated.
Support for Seeking Solutions: Keys to Homeownership is provided by Educators Credit Union, Greater Milwaukee Association of Realtors and Geis Garage Doors.
