yurt

Exotik Innovations

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Exotik’s founders, Michel Labadie and Debra Lamothe, founded each of their projects and prototypes on their personal values. Their primary concern was to achieve and surpass their own quality standards. With a mysterious mixture of creativity, meticulous detail and cultural sensitivity, Exotik Innovations stages a high quality product, combined with charm, rusticity, and durability.

Prototype 2 and office

Their combined professional experience counts almost 30 years with the Cirque du Soleil, as Project managers and event planners. They put to profit this experience, by betting on their own dreams and building a high quality product as innovative and original, based on values as enterprising as their past employer.

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Tiny House in a Landscape

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This weeks Tiny House in a Landscape is of a yurt set in a valley somewhere in Colorado. I am a big fan of yurts as I love there simplicity and ease of setting up. They seem perfect for a wilderness hideaway such as this one. Yurts are also used … Read more

Laurel Nest Yurts Workshop

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Laurel Nest Yurts is offering a workshop in the beautiful mountains outside of Santa Cruz, California and you are invited to join them to get some hands on experience in building a yurt. Laurel Nest Yurts is offering a “Complete Yurt Building Experience” and a DIY Yurt Building Workshop. Laurel … Read more

The circHouse Yurt

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Sarah one of my readers brought this new yurt to my attention. It is very unique and I think has some real possibilities. A company based in Colorado called circHouse has designed this visionary shelter that could be used for many activities, but I see the potential of a tiny house and a very modern take on the old fashioned yurt.

One of the issues with yurts that sends many people away is the fact that they are made of canvas or wood and usually have a lattice skeleton which blocks your view. A serious concern if you are in a beautiful area. circHouse has taken the age old shape of the yurt and put technology to work creating an innovative new structure. By utilizing polycabonate and acrylic wall structures, a recycled steel frame and natural wood paneling they have created a modern looking structure that is compact for shipping and that can be assembled in a few short hours.

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Yurt Lady: Living in the Round

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Happy Independence Day! With summer fully upon most of the country, let’s celebrate one of the best tiny houses for enjoying the outdoors. We’ve covered numerous yurts in the past, but Becky Kemery a.k.a.”The Yurt Lady” and her book, Yurts: Living in the Round, shows how these structures can be comfortable and elegant while still letting in the outdoors.

Becky has lived in yurts for many years in the mountains of the American Northwest. Her book was completed a few years ago while living in her own portable fabric yurt on a permaculture homestead in Idaho. She has also created an educational website called Yurt Info, a newsletter and a Facebook page for other yurt owners and fans of the wood and fabric buildings. The Yurt Info site offers information on how to buy or build a yurt, and includes a forum and links to numerous yurt videos and photo albums.

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Pacific Domes

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A friend of mine recently purchased a 20-foot Pacific Dome to be used as a meditation and yoga space for her and her husband’s spiritual group. I was surprised at how light and airy it looked, yet it’s sturdy enough to withstand our winter winds. I thought it might make a great tiny house.

Their Pacific Dome is attached to a temporary insulated foundation and the entire structure took about four days to erect. Currently the dome does not have insulation, but they plan to order a special cover to be used in the winter. A solar fan is attached to the outside to provide air circulation during the summer. So far the structure has been very sturdy…even in our area’s notorious winds and heavy snows. Unfortunately, a few neighbors reported the dome to the local building department and the department now wants a set of structural calculations about the dome which will be supplied by the engineer at Pacific Domes.

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Laurel Nest Yurts Workshop

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Laurel Nest Yurts will offer their next yurt building workshop from April 22nd, 23rd and 24th. Workshop location: Laurel Nest Yurts 264-1 Marlowe Dr. Mills River, North Carolina We will be teaching people how to build all yurt parts. All participants will leave the workshop with knowledge about building their own yurt, … Read more

Vermont 2011 Yurt Building Workshop

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Bruce Sargent contacted me about a Yurt building workshop he will be holding in Shaftsbury, Vermont this summer. Bruce say: I built two 12′ yurts last summer each, with 12 students, and each, in two days, start to finish and up. I’ll be offering the lessons learned in a workshop this summer. Course details … Read more

Turtleback Nomadic Yurts

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Kim discovered this company recently and sent me the link. I made contact with the owners of this new yurt company based in Colorado. This yurt is unique in the fact that it is not canvas but it is easy to take apart and move to another location if necessary.

Isaac Murphy the owner of Turtleback Nomadic Yurts says this one is 16 foot in diamater  or 200 square feet. It can be put up or taken down in two hours. 6 ft. 8 in. interior eve height and 10 ft. interior center height at hub. The basic package includes 7 windows and is made from pine and aspen wood. Insulation R-value approx. 5. No flapping canvas, solid and stable. $8000 basic package.

We are located near Dolores, Colorado, about 30 miles northeast of the four corners. Aside from what you can see on the blog, we are also working on a fully insulated model, slightly heavier and beefed up for winter living. It will be slightly larger, 18ft. diameter, and use 2×6 rafters as opposed to 2×4 on the one see on the website. We do all the manufacturing ourselves in our little shop here on the property, from lumber we purchase from the lumber yard. Eventually, we’d like to buy wood from one of the local mills and cure it ourselves, providing a good local source.

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Solargon Paonia

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I received a recent update about Solargon Homes and a cute little cabin they recently installed in Paonia, Colorado.

This is the latest version of the Solargon 20 with 311 sq. ft of living space. Owners Kale and Laura have finished this charming cabin complete with deck, sandstone patio, hot tub and root cellar. The Solargon 20-4 features a four sided roof system over an ultra efficient SIPs octagon.

Small gable windows illuminate the T&G ceiling giving this cabin an open and light living space. The SIPs building envelope, which included all wall and roof panels was assembled in 6 hours and the owners completed the entire project in 3 months.

The approximate cost for this home was between $100 and $140 a square foot. To follow other projects visit the Solargon blog.

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Eco-Art Project Tiny House

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Jamie discovered this on Ebay and the person that built it has a website too. This is partially green construction, as the materials were salvaged from a recycling warehouse and from Habitat for Humanity whenever suitable materials were available. It is a successful eco-art project that took 5 months to complete.

The cabin, called Canopy Cottage, looks magical at night- like a Chinese lantern; it glows.

The tipi influence is expressed as the cream- colored canvas wall covering. It has a special feature: The part that covers the door can be stored over the rafter (as shown) or can be let down, over the doorway. When you are in a tipi, the inner wall has the option of covering the door also– this imparts a feeling of being closed in and cozy. I like the canvas to be down when it is cold and rainy; up on the rafter (as shown) when it is sunny.

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Tiny House in a Landscape

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Colorado Yurt Owner Michael Drummy bought 15 acres in rural, picturesque northern New Mexico – “O’Keeffe Country” it’s called because the painter Georgia O’Keeffe lived there for the second half of her life. After buying the property outright we didn’t have the means to build anything very expensive down there. … Read more