design

TINY Documentary House on Fox 31 Denver

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Christopher Smith and his girlfriend Merete Mueller of the TINY movie project were recently profiled by Fox 31 Denver. Christopher and Merete have towed their 127 square foot house to their remote property in Park County, Colorado. Their tiny house is nearly finished, but according to the video, the build … Read more

Tiny Offices on Urban Roots Farm

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On a lot in back of a former motel, there is a farm. And on that farm there are some tiny offices…okay…I won’t sing “E-I-E-I-O”, but the structures being built on the Urban Roots Farm in Reno, Nev. are worth tooting a few horns about. Urban Roots is currently being created as an educational farm and community center where schools, children and families can learn about gardening, alternative building techniques and the natural areas of the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Range. The farm sits on a 3/4 acre plot that was donated by Kelly Rae and Pam Haberman of HabeRae Homes (which the Tiny House Blog profiled a few years ago). Kelly and Pam also designed two tiny structures to be used as offices for the Urban Roots staff.

Kelly is unofficially calling the two building designs ModPods. She and Pam were inspired by some similar structures they came across while traveling by motorcycle on Orcas Island, Wash.

“I nearly went off the road on my bike when I saw these tiny houses,” Kelly said.

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IKEA aktiv

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The new “aktiv” house by ideabox has all you love about IKEA…with no assembly required. While this pre-fab home is not tiny, it’s under 1,000 square feet and is designed with open, airy living in mind. The 745 square feet aktiv was created by ideabox and IKEA designers from Portland, Ore., built with contemporary corrugated steel and fiber cement and is delivered with everything (except furniture) included.

The one-bedroom, one-bath home comes with all of the closets, cabinets, countertops and flooring installed. Both the kitchen and the bathroom contain IKEA appliances which includes an induction cooktop and convection oven, a counter depth refrigerator and dishwasher, a two sink vanity and a front load washer and dryer. Buyers can select their own wall and floor colors and, of course, they can fill it with IKEA furniture.

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Tiny House Challenge – Domain Studio

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Guest Post by Frank Dobrucki

My Tiny House Dilemma/Challenge. Years ago, as I was watching the Las Vegas housing market crumble, the local TV News was reporting that Las Vegas did not have to worry about the national trend in housing, because Las Vegas was going vertical! Yes, we had well over 100 huge high-rise projects on the horizon! I thought that the newscasters were out of their mind. There is no way that you can insulate one type of housing project, specially when it is an outrageously overpriced concept and believe that this will save us from economic catastrophe. Fast-forward, Las Vegas is truly ground zero when it comes to the national housing market disaster. All of the high-rise projects included, even though most were never built!

Photo Credits: Frank Dobrucki

When I looked at the floor plans of many of the projects, several entry-level models were less than 800 square feet and had starting prices of $600,000 and monthly homeowner fees of approximately $800 to $1,000. I knew that I could do a better job of coming up with the kind of housing that people really need and something that people could afford.

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Tiny House Video

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Kim a reader of the Tiny House Blog discovered this video and I think it is a perfect example of what can be done with a little hard work and enginutity. I am not familiar with the language in the video, but I’m sure it is European. This person took … Read more

Sri Lanka Shipping Container Retreat

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A friend and fellow tiny house lover recently sent me this link from Container Home on this shipping container cabin retreat in Sri Lanka. The house was constructed with local reclaimed material in about a month by architect Damith Premathilake. The tiny house is located on an Army base and was built for a lieutenant colonel.

The 700 square foot retreat is constructed of two shipping containers, timber strips from old bunkers and weapons boxes and used railway sleepers. It is designed to embrace the views and climate of the surrounding environment, and create a place of relaxation and beauty while using already available resources.

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Cabin Fever Shelter Series

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The modern prefab cabin company, Cabin Fever, in partnership with award-winning architect, Ed Binkley, has designed a new series of homes called the Shelter Series. The basis of these homes begins with the question: “We don’t buy cars by the pound, so why should we buy homes by the square footage?”

This series of homes meets all of the fundamental criteria in a house. The space is sized to be functional while also allowing flexibility. The uses for these homes include high density small lot urban and suburban infill, relief housing, student housing, auxiliary dwelling units, and specifically, affordable housing.

The Shelter Series homes range in size from 340 square feet to around 1,400 square feet and are also designed to meet a variety of green certification programs with the real emphasis being on energy and water savings along with a superior exterior shell.

Available now is the Shelter 640. This small home features 2 bedrooms, a full bath, generous kitchen, and ample storage/closet space. The interior is filled with light from the standard and clerestory windows. The lot for this design may be as small as 30 feet by 60 feet, and the 640 can be built on a concrete foundation or a raised floor system. The Shelter 640 is priced at $47,300.

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Bend me, shape me: Space saving furniture

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Tiny houses usually necessitate thinking out of the box when it comes to furniture. Standard furniture for “regular” homes may not fit into a tiny house, so several designers have come up with some interesting and innovative designs for space saving furniture. Interestingly enough, while most of these designers think out of the box, their designs fold up into boxes!

Trick

Trick is the name of this multifunctional furniture that can be used as a bookshelf, a chair, and a dining set. The minimalist multifunction furniture is made from Milan based industrial designer Sakura Adachi.

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LEAP Adaptive Hummingbird

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LEAP Adaptive sells modern, green home plans online and they have recently designed their smallest home plan and are making it available to owners, contractors and architects. The Hummingbird is a 480-square-foot home that is energy efficient and utilizes a passive photovoltaic framework, low-VOC materials and the latest in green technology.

Wandering Book Artists Gypsy Wagon

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Peter and Donna Thomas are book artists from Northern California who have been spending the last year traveling around the U.S. in a handmade gypsy wagon. The wagon is their temporary home as well as a place for them to sell their books, teach book arts workshops and give talks and lectures. Wherever they’ve gone, their gypsy wagon has attracted attention for its whimsical color and design.

Peter and Donna fell in love with gypsy wagons when they were craftspeople at Renaissance fairs. Many of the fair vendors built the wagons to sleep in and sell their wares from. Peter and Donna built the wagon on a 16-foot Carson car hauler. The entire trailer weighs 3,800 pounds and it took them three years to build. The rafters were made with laminated pine boards and the floor with locally milled sugar pine. It is insulated, contains a small kitchen and electricity. They have a camping toilet in the closet and a solar shower that they keep in their tow vehicle, but the couple usually use campgrounds, friendly locals and universities for their bathing.

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Managing Miniaturization

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Guest Post by Matthew Hofmann

10 advantages of living and working in tiny spaces (with wheels)

Hofmann kicked off his quest for inner peace at the most logical place – CraigsList. He found an Airstream in “fair condition.” A 4-digit deal was struck and one dark and rainy night he rescued the abandoned abode from behind a chain link fence guarded by a Pit Bull in Mira Loma.

“Crap! I’d just written a sizeable check for what looked like a glorified dog house. The trailer’s swaying back and forth along rain-soaked 101, like the pendulum of doubt pounding in my brain.”

The body was solid, but inside the trailer was a mess. “I’m fairly certain the last resident was the junkyard dog.”

  • Step #1: Demo – Take everything out (which got the wet dog smell out).
  • Step #2: Design – The creative process, Hofmann believes, isn’t accomplished by adding more, but by taking away what’s distracting. “The design questions were How much does one remove? How much does one keep?

“For me the solution was creating open space using honest materials. I wanted to bring a sense of outdoors in, so it needed to be bright and airy by nature, yet warm and multi-functional.”

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