In a year where the theme of the upcoming Calgary Home and Garden Show has taken on a distinctly DIY feel, it seems a tad ironic that one of the most talked about additions is a home that is anything but.

Along with the 650 exhibitors that will be on hand, this year’s Home and Garden Show will feature a 1,700 sq. ft. home. And while the addition of a custom built home right there in the BMO Centre is nothing to sneeze at, the real innovation comes in the process by which the home came to be there.

Developers of modular single-family and multi-unit homes that are far cry from the single-wide and double-wide prefab homes of old, Karoleena Homes offers homeowners the option of having their new “systems-built” dwelling prepared offsite and then delivered to the building site and craned into place, with only a few final touches necessary before the owners are given the keys.

“We’ve been working on coming up with smart designs that work for the inner-city that can be built efficiently using the systems-built modular technique,” said Kurt Goodjohn, who co-owns the company along with his brother Kris.

Under the systems-built model, homeowners select a design (or have one custom built), which is then constructed to code in a controlled manufacturing facility. The process not only allows the company to construct homes in half the time (anywhere from three weeks to three months) of the conventional process, but according to Kurt, it also provides a greater level of quality control than the typical builder can provide.

“You’re home is never exposed to harmful weather conditions during the construction process. Imagine if you wanted to get a new car, and after deciding on a model, a truck comes up to your house and delivers all the parts on your driveway, and you’ve got to sit there and put this car together. It doesn’t make any sense, so why would people build a house outside?”

In addition to quality control, Kurt adds that the efficiency of building indoors can reduce the amount of excess material that ends up in landfills by 30 per cent when compared to the conventional home, as well as providing a far more robust construction in order for the homes to withstand being transported and craned into place.

The speed at which the homes can be put into place was highlighted recently when “The Graycie” — a fully automated high-end inner-city condo complex that includes such features as geothermal heating and tankless water heaters — sprung up literally overnight, much to the surprise of many residents in Marda Loop, the southwest community where the four-unit complex is located.

“It was a 5,000 sq. ft. building with three floors, and we craned it all in the middle of the night, and then the crane came and set it up, and by the time people came home at 5:00 in the afternoon, the whole entire building was put together,” said Kurt. “It was hilarious watching some of the people walking down the street. The shock on their faces, it was like an alien came and plopped a building down.”

While the inclusion of a fully constructed state-of-the-art home might be the focal point for many at this year’s show, with over 650 exhibitors on hand, there is plenty to offer for those heading down to the show.

Included in that list is a 6,000 sq. ft. garden oasis where local landscapers will show those in attendance how to turn that pile of dirt into blooming roses and blossoming begonias, an HGTV stage that features DIY workshops and the CREN®-sponsored Garden Marketplace, which will contain gardening tools, sculptures, plants, flowers, arts, pottery and experts who can speak as to how best to use it all.

As the show coincides with the final weekend of the Olympic games in Vancouver, if anyone is hesitant to head down for fear of missing any of Canada’s medal wining performances, they can rest assured that steps have been taken to make sure that those who want to watch the games can do just that. Presented by Avenue Magazine, the aLounge is complete with a projector screen, a restaurant and plenty of TVs to (hopefully) watch Canadians strike gold.

“We put our two teams together and brainstormed a bunch of ideas so that people could come down to the show without missing any of the Olympic events taking place,” said Terri Higgins, show manager for The Calgary Home and Garden Show.

— The Calgary Home and Garden Show takes place Feb. 28-29 at the BMO Centre at Stampede Park.