Given enough time, even the most despised buildings become history, and from history pass into art.

A ruined Welsh farmhouse nestled in the hills, which once would have been nothing more than a blot on the rural landscape to neighbours used to an unsullied view, is transformed into a poignant reminder of our agricultural past and a very desirable piece of real estate to boot.

The redbrick mills and factories of the inner cities are redeveloped as multi-million-pound loft apartments, and in London a hulking power station on the Thames has become the Tate Modern.

But even among the generally uninspired architecture of Newport, few of the thousands who pass them every week will shed a tear for the prefabs.

Erected just after the Second World War as a temporary initiative to provide many left homeless by bombing raids with a roof over their heads, Newport council's programme to finally replace them with bungalows is well under way.

Local photographer Gary Robins has taken it upon himself to record these disappearing reminders of Gwent history before it is too late, and the resulting exhibition is running at Newport Museum.

Prefabrications: Newport's Temporary Bungalows, The First Fifty Years is an extraordinary look at a feature of the landscape most residents take for granted.

Robins said: "The prefab estates have suffered a variety of derogatory descriptions and comparisons, including Asbestosville, Legoland, and Toytown.

"It is the combination of the traditional and futuristic, the almost unnervingly bland, yet somehow highly individual, that makes the prefabs unique.

"It seems that in designing the prefabs, and allowing them to be sited so well, some of the most successful artificial communities ever created in Britain were born.

"My area of interest was specifically the Newport prefabs, and this photo essay reflects their idiosyncratic presence in that town."

Prefabrications runs at Newport Museum and Art Gallery until August 24.