Michael Janzen who is building the Tiny Free House also is quite the designer himself. He recently started a blog called Tiny House Design and has started adding a few of his own small or tiny house designs to it. A few weeks ago Michael spotted a cool little Austrian hotel room online built from a large concrete storm drain pipe. He decided to take this idea and design a 320 square foot house using 12 foot diameter pipe. I’ll let him explain it in more detail below.

I chose to imagine using four big 12 foot diameter by 8 foot long sections as the basic building blocks for this concept home. This seems to be the largest standard size concrete pipe you can buy. After adding flat floors the total square footage of four of these big pipes would be about 320 square feet. Not exactly a tiny house but definitely small and plenty of space for a small home or vacation rental.

I think this design works the best. It would be the simplest to build and would require the least amount of on-site concrete work. The four sections could also be lined up in a row but the entry would be lost. The southern orientation adds a passive solar benefit and would help warm the home in the summer. The added insulation provided by the earth berms would provide the thermal mass needed to naturally regulate temperature year round. Only the main living space faces south but I think this would be sufficient to keep the space comfortable. Placing the bedroom in the back would also give the home owner a place to escape on particularly hot days.

Go to the Tiny House Design site to learn more. Michael made a total of four designs using this concept so be sure and check them all out.

Design by Michael Janzen (click on picture to view larger image)

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