A history of octagonal structure. Building octagon house designs and 8-sided homes. (2024)

FAQs

What is the history of octagonal houses? ›

Octagonal homes (8-sided) first became popular in the United States in the late 19th century, but their recorded history dates back literally thousands of years. Throughout time, the octagon shape has been a symbolic architectural theme representing regeneration, rebirth and renewal.

One disadvantage is that it may be more challenging to design and construct octagonal buildings compared to more traditional shapes ².

Octagon buildings and structures are characterized by an octagonal plan form, whether a perfect geometric octagon or a regular eight-sided polygon with approximately equal sides.

He viewed the octagon form as a healthful, economical, and modern innovation in housing and argued that it offered increased sunlight and ventilation, as well as savings on heating and building costs. Octagon houses were built across the country but were more of an anomaly than a common style.

These benefits all derive from the geometry of an octagon: the shape encloses space efficiently, minimizing external surface area and consequently heat loss and gain, building costs etc. A circle is the most efficient shape, but difficult to build and awkward to furnish, so an octagon is a sensible approximation.

In the number symbolism of Medieval Europe, eight was seen as representing cosmic balance and eternal life. 3 Related to this, the octagon also had deep significance for the Roman Catholic Church. The octagon and the star octagram were religious symbols for rebirth and resurrection.

Triangles have a large base that is able to support the weight of the rest of the triangle that leads to a small tip. Even rectangular houses are made up of different triangles to support the house. This makes a triangle the strongest shape for houses.

Properties of Octagon

These have eight sides and eight angles. All the sides and all the angles are equal, respectively. There are a total of 20 diagonals in a regular octagon. Sum of all the exterior angles of the octagon is 360°, and each angle is 45°(45×8=360).

The geometric shape that has the minimum surface-area-to-volume ratio is a sphere, but that's hardly practical for a house. A cube is the most reasonable, compact shape for a home to minimize heat transfer.

The octagon, which is transitional between the circle and the square, came to represent Jesus' resurrection in early Christianity and was used in the ground plans of martyriums and baptisteries for that reason. The domes themselves were sometimes octagonal, rather than circular.

Who builds octagon houses? ›

Since 1968, Topsider Homes has been designing, pre-engineering and prefabricating octagon houses. With thousands of octagonal homes shipped worldwide, no prefab, pre-engineered or kit house company has Topsider's experience or expertise in octagon home building.

In geometry, an octagon (from Ancient Greek ὀκτάγωνον (oktágōnon) 'eight angles') is an eight-sided polygon or 8-gon. A regular octagon has Schläfli symbol {8} and can also be constructed as a quasiregular truncated square, t{4}, which alternates two types of edges.

President Madison and Dolley Madison took up residence in The Octagon, one of Washington's first great houses, located close to the White House at the corner of 18th Street and New York Avenue. From The Octagon, the president ran his administration and the first lady ran Washington society.

In regard to sacred geometry when viewing the octagon, there are two shapes coming together as one; which is the circle and square. The circle represents heaven and the square represents earth, thus unifying these two energies through an infinite connection.

The octagon style homes are by far the easiest style of architecture to recognize. As hinted in its name “Octagon”, the exterior is formed by an eight-sided shape of walls. Some examples have shown as little as six exterior walls up to sixteen-sided walls.

Approximately 1,000 octagon houses were built in America between roughly 1850-1870. Though fewer than 100 graced the landscape of Wisconsin, those that did are rich in history. Curiously enough, whether due to their odd shape or their age, octagon houses are often reported to have supernatural residents.

The octagonal shape provides a more rigid log structure than the simple rectangular long church design, allowing a larger nave to be built. Christie believes that this is why the octagonal design was adopted alongside the cruciform plan.

A lot has changed since UFC 1, but one thing remains the same - the iconic Octagon. But who invented it? The conventional wisdom is that the Octagon was conceived by Conan director (and Gracie student/father in Law) John Milius.

Stilt houses have been used for millennia, with evidence in the European Alps that stilt houses were constructed on a lake over 6000 years ago and Herodotus making reference to stilt housing on lakes in Paeonia. Settlements primarily composed of stilt housing are common in Micronesia and in Oceania.