design

The ecoPerch

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Treehouses have been making the news lately with Deek Diedrickson’s “Wolfe’s Den” and Joel Allen’s HemLoft. Across the pond, the ecoPerch is a new tiny house design based on a treehouse from the Blue Forest company in the U.K. This beautiful structure is designed to fit into the natural surroundings … Read more

Tuff Shed Tiny Houses

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Most people are familiar with Tuff Shed’s storage sheds and garages, but now the 30-year-old company is designing and manufacturing structures that could be used as tiny homes. Tuff Shed’s speciality structures come in a Modern style and a Weekender style and each of them feature several different sizes (including … Read more

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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