I just watched an episode of Grand Designs New Zealand where a group built a summerhouse (called a 'bach') on a beach. It was a good episode all round with a good bunch of people building a nice small house for not much money.

One thing that I found particularly interesting was the technique they used to make the first floor, using a system called Click-Raft. This was invented by the presenter Chris Moller and his team and involves sheets of ply cut by CNC machines and then slotted together to make a rigid lattice panel, which is also quite attractive. It can be used to make entire buildings apparently. Here are some links to more information:

http://click-raft.blogspot.co.uk/
http://cma-u.com/project/click-raft-type-02
http://cma-u.com/project/click-raft-type-03
http://architecturenow.co.nz/articles/cnc-the-new-approach-to-building/

Very interesting, ill bookmark that and read it later.

I think the embodied energy in ply is greater than sawn timber.
According to ICE
http://opus.bath.ac.uk/12382/1/Hammond_%26_Jones_Embodied_energy_%26_carbon_Proc_ICE-Energy_2008_161%282%29_87-98.pdf
Ply has an embodied energy of 15 MJ/kg and general timber has 8.5 MJ/kg.

I went to see the man that make furniture from CNCed ply today. He was involved in architecture before he took up furniture design.
http://www.chipfixfurniture.co.uk/

Was there not a house on Grand Design that was made from machined ply a few years back. Seem to remember that it used screw piles as the foundation.

If you are interested in plywood cnc housing check out https://wikihouse.cc/

Its still early days.

There is another related one for furniture https://www.opendesk.cc/

All you need is access to a CNC machine. All the designs are open source.