Tiny Houses on the Prairie

“Oh Snap! Homesteader Postcards, the Facebook of 1906” an article written by Heather Murphy at the Slate website features some really unique tiny homes built by homesteaders out on the prairies. The images in this gallery were gathered over a period of 20 years by snapshot collector Michael Williams. They … Read more

Modern Sheepwagon

This beautiful custom sheep wagon by Wizard Wagonworks is based on the original “sheep camp” of the 1880’s with a modern twist. It is designed for both highway and off-road use as well as for durability, comfort and ease of maintenance. Kenny Harris of Wizard wagonworks is in the cabinetry business and built two of these sheep wagons according to a customer’s specifications. One is now being sold for $60,000, but Kenny can build any custom sheep wagon for less than the current price.

The exterior of the wagon contains laminated oak struts, a T&G planked floor and metal roofing. The wagon is insulated and the exterior wood is finished with teak oil. The interior has oak bead board paneling and the benches, tables, cabinet doors and drawer fronts are solid oak. The wagon can by towed by a truck or other large vehicle and handles well on the highway with speeds up to 70 MPH.

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Bend me, shape me: Space saving furniture

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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Wood and Wood Storage

As I’m sure many of you are, we’re looking toward spring, which for us, also means looking toward next winter by getting the firewood cut and split so it can begin drying out.

Heating exclusively with our wood burning stove is pretty new to us. We moved to our Little House in 2007, but didn’t begin heating with just the woodstove until the winter of 2009 after a major ice storm showed us how much we could save without using the electric space heaters.

Thanks to that ice storm, we still have plenty of wood for next winter, people practically beg us to come and pick the wood up from their property. A good friend and neighbor has also let us use his log splitter.

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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.

casita5

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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 … Read more