Better Built Portable Buildings
For anyone with vision, a few building skills and a great set of tools, several of these portable buildings by Dix Enterprises in Wichita, Kansas can become a personalized tiny house. Better Built Portable Storage Buildings by Dix are outdoor storage sheds, barns, garages, cabins and offices that are built onsite in Kansas and then delivered by truck. At that point they can be customized by the customer. Dix claims all of their portable barns, sheds, cabins and garages are built to hold up under heavy use and provide a lifetime of service. Most of the buildings are for storage, livestock and gardening, but three of their designs may make a great tiny house: the Lofted Porch, the Portable Casita and the Mini Cottage.
Little House and Laminate Flooring
We didn’t do everything right when we built The Little House, but I love the things we did do right.
One of those things was to skip the carpeting and instead, we installed laminate flooring that looks like wood.
I put a lot of thought into the flooring because I hate carpet – and here’s why – we have dogs.
Dogs and carpet don’t mix. I would like to say I was the genius who came up with the plan to forego the carpet, but my aunt moved here before we did and was actually the brains behind the plan.
She’s been here since 1999 and her high-quality, laminate flooring still looks almost as good today as it did then, and she has several big dogs running around with their nails.
As well, carpet is just not good here in the country, where the clay is red and seed ticks dwell (seed ticks are tiny little baby ticks that are worse than their grown counterparts and can burrow in carpet).
When we pulled the carpet up to replace it so we could sell our house in the city, I was doubly glad I would never have to deal with carpet again. Even when you keep it clean, the dirt and dust (and I suppose mites) that congregates under the carpet and padding is one of the grossest things I’ve ever seen!
As with most people I know, our primary consideration had to be with cost when building The Little House. Our next consideration was the convenience of cleaning/maintaining a floor with the dogs.
When taking both cost and convenience into consideration, hardwood was automatically ruled out.
While I would have liked to have gone with bamboo, as it is the most environmentally friendly flooring, cost also eliminated that choice as well.
We were left with laminate and I’m very happy with it. In The Little House, we went with a light oak, as the décor is more cabin-based. In The Belle Writer’s Studio, I went with a darker wide wood plank, as the décor there is what I like to consider more “19th century country law office.”
If you’re going to choose a laminate flooring, here’s some tips that made things easy for us:
- In The Little House, we went online and chose a high-quality laminate as the prices were cheaper then the stores, even with shipping. We had the company ship us samples first to make sure it was what we were looking for.
- For both buildings, we chose an easy snap together flooring that uses no glue.
- We haven’t found it to be true that you can’t use laminate in the bathroom due to the risk of water. I suppose it might not be a good idea if it were to get wet all of the time (if you have kids, for example), but we’ve even had an incident where my husband left the shower curtain out and the floor didn’t buckle. Of course, we soaked up as much as we could and put fans on the floor to dry it as quickly as possible.
- We weren’t here for much of the building process on The Little House, so we hired a flooring company to install it for us. BIG waste of money. The snap together flooring is easy and can be done in a small house in a matter of hours. Just make sure you follow the directions. If you have a helper, my husband says it’s easier!
- The one thing I would have done differently was to go with the next higher grade. We went with a medium priced, medium quality floor and we’ve found when things hit it just right, it will dent and even chip.
Guest Post by Kerri Fivecoat-Campbell for the Tiny House Blog
Office Floor
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Tiny Green Cabins
Inspired by David Thoreau and energized by the opportunity to live a more sustainable and simple life, Jim Wilkins of St. Paul, Minnesota, has designed and built several tiny green cabins available for sale.
Each of these cabins have been developed to be multi-purpose, eco-friendly, transportable and stylish.
Tiny Green Cabins are earth friendly cabins ranging in size from 48 square feet to 252 square feet.
The Wildflower cabin is 120 square feet and built with green certified materials and reclaimed products as well as recycled materials. The walls and the floor are insulated with Soft Touch Cotton insulation made from recycled blue jeans.
The 8×18 foot Wildflower cabin base price is $19,900. Several options are included such as pine or cedar paneling, a propane fireplace and solar tripod. An upgraded model is for sale for $23,500 which includes Trex decking and wavy edge cedar wainscotting (which I just love!).
Two other green cabins profiled on Jim’s website are the 6×8 foot Mini-Sota which starts at $8,358 or the 8×10 foot Sunflower Starting at $10,499.
Neither price includes cabinetry, appliances or shipping. A $2,000 deposit will reserve a production date for a Tiny Green Cabin. A 50 percent deposit is required two weeks prior to production, with the balance due upon completion and delivery of the home.
Standard Items in the Tiny Green Cabins:
- FSC Cert. Mixed * SW-COC-000669 Lumber
- Ultra Touch Cotton Ins 6X16 – Recycled Denim (cotton) Insulation – (Blue Jeans)
- Finger jointed 2 X 3’s and 2 X 4’s
- Recycled & Reclaimed Lumber
- Anderson Silverline Windows
- Pro-Rib Steel 29 gauge panel – Emerald Green
- Trex Decking (recycled plastic and wood fibers)
- Low VOC paints
- Acrylic caulks
- Energy Star Electrical Boxes
- CDX roof and exterior sheathing
- Tyvek Exterior building wrap
- Vertical OSB substrate “Smart Panel” exterior siding
- Rebond (recycled) carpet padding
- Insulated windows (low e on some models both in recyclable aluminum and vinyl)
- Type 6 nylon carpet from Shaw
Optional Items in the Tiny Green Cabins:
- Recycled tires and axles.
- I-beam manufactured from scrap, recycled steel
- OSB Floor, Wall, and Roof Decking
- “James Hardie” Cemplank exterior siding
- Title 24 interior lighting
- Insulated fiberglass (50 year warranty) exterior entry doors.
- “Rinnai” tankless gas water heater
- PEX water systems (recyclable with no solvent connections)
- DR 24 PVC and ABS drain lines, less materials with recycled contents
- Gypsum panels (recycled paper)
- Energy Star appliances (most standard models and all up grades)
- Programmable thermostat
- 2×6 S4S Cedar Porch Decking
- Spray foam exterior wall insulation
- Electric Fireplace
- Cordwood Simulated Siding/Wainscoat
- Wavy Edge Rough Sawn Cedar Siding
- Water saver toilets, tub and shower diverters
- Quick recovery water heaters
- Aluminum (recyclable) mini-blinds
Jim also offers custom services for those that desire new designs along with products that can be incorporated into the tiny cabins, such as denim/cotton insulation, recycled and reclaimed materials, FSC Certified lumber products, solar panels for power off the grid, homemade soaps, organic products and other earth friendly sustainable products.
By Christina Nellemann for the (Tiny House Blog)
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Gado Gado Teak Guest House
In the middle of winter, I start dreaming about tropical locales. For people who are lucky enough to be able to let the outdoors into their homes almost all year long, the “Wee Hus” from Gado Gado International in Santa Rosa, Calif. might be the perfect tiny house for you.
These tiny teak homes with their exquisite details are designed from the original style found in Indonesia and are built in Java. Both the original traditional tiny houses and the newer ones are made from reclaimed teak using traditional mortise and tenon joinery.
Gado Gado uses nails and bolts sparingly where needed for structural strength and safety.The tiny houses are named after Gado Gado owner, David Sussman’s Irish Aunt Patsy.
Indonesia is in earthquake country, and there are more >6.0 earthquakes in Java than in California. These little houses have stood up to large temblors precisely because of how they were constructed: the complex joinery system with through-going tenons through tenons in two directions gives the structure sufficient strength but allows enough flexibility to sway during earthquake movements without falling over.
The ceilings of some of the tiny houses range from simple teak lap-jointed planks to highly carved original “joglo” pieces. Gado Gado cuts the roof shingles by hand out of reclaimed teak boards.
Tumpang Sari Carved Ceiling
Joglo Painted Ceiling
The tiny houses range from 8×8 ft. up to 16×16 ft., and are priced at $10,000 up to about $30,000 based on size, complexity, and the amount of original or new carving requested by the customer. They are built for longevity, and can stand up to rain, snow and direct sun. Teak is more resistant to rot and bugs than any hardwood or softwood grown in the U.S. due to its high resin content and the presence of 1%-2% silica (basically like beach sand) taken up by the teak tree from the soil. These houses are not yet built to U.S. standards for year-round living, although such modifications are not difficult during installation. The original Indonesian teak homes were not built with wiring or plumbing, but this can be added later by the customer.
Gado Gado offers a CD-ROM that shows the step-by-step construction of a 16×12 ft Wee Hus. You can order the CD-ROM from the website.
The teak homes ship to the customer as “knock down” with each mortise and tenon marked to show where they will be put together. Scaled drawings of the pier foundation are also included. Gado Gado recommends that customers invite all their friends that are handy with tools and make a day of it (a 12×16 ft. tiny house takes about 1.5 days to set up with 8 people). However, it is worth the money to get the owner, David Sussman and one of his staff, out to the site to guide the installation.
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