I'm in a wheelchair. Brand new houses built with stairs make me sad. I've often thought I'd love to work with an architect to design accessible houses: it's not just for me, anyone with limited mobility or energy would benefit.
Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
21–30 of 156 posts
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#22My wife and I live in a ~720 sq. foot loft we built inside of an airplane hangar. The story is here:
http://www.makingthishome.com/hangar-loft-remodel/
We really love living in smaller spaces.
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#23If you're interested in learning more about this, I highly suggest subscribing to Kirsten Dirksen on Youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCDsElQQt_gCZ9LgnW-7v-cQ
She publishes new videos every couple weeks or so and is intimately tied into the tiny house movement.
She also covers things involving alternate ways of living, diy, etc. Lovely person.
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#24I think technology is the enabling factor behind the tiny house movement. Books, CDs, movies, photos, files, paperwork, videogames: all compressed down to the size of a hard drive. So many random gadgets have been replaced by a smart phone, like camera equipment, phones, flashlights, calendars, etc. Now people are ditching TVs as well and just using iPads and laptops to watch video. There are other more subtle things…
When I lived in New York, literally 100% of my local friends used wash-and-fold and owned nothing to take care of clothing.
Not to mention: don't have cars...
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#25This is fine in a warm country, or in a place where you're going to be in or out of your house all the time. Living in a cold and/or isolated place, being cooped up in such a small area would be unhealthy, you need to move around much more as a matter of course. Particularly if you're working at home, you'd have to be very proactive to avoid serious impacts on your health, because your lifestyle would be almost inher…
Whoever's down voting Brakenshire is down voting the truth. There are actual studies that show the point[1].
1) and since I am 7 hours away from my office, I cannot point them out right now
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#26Take a look at this:
http://www.cubeproject.org.uk/
Genius use of space.
Saw it on a great UK TV show called George Clark's Amazing Spaces, where there are lots of brilliant creative ideas.
Edit: Link to a brochure with a nice expanded drawing: http://www.boltonbuildings.co.uk/PDF/Cube.pdf
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#27I'm in a wheelchair. Brand new houses built with stairs make me sad. I've often thought I'd love to work with an architect to design accessible houses: it's not just for me, anyone with limited mobility or energy would benefit.
This is basically a mobile home, which has no foundation. As such, there is nothing in the design which is not easily re-built to your spec. The design is inherently modular. When you are dealing with a 200sq ft living space, its best to have it tailored to your own needs, and not a random or lowest common-denominator-based spec. The common areas, however take on more importance in a community or non-remote setting ans thus are the relevant areas to consider from an architecture perspective.
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#28Should be retitled "Architect randomly decides to build a single-wide trailer home"
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#29If you haven't seen the documentary "tiny house movement" watch it... Personally, I think these efforts lack an understanding of basic annoyances: Assume you want to sleep when others don't? Oh - the answer is this is for happy single people. Assume you overcook your steak and the whole place smokes up and your bedding now stinks. Assume you have more than (1) friend over. Have kids? I LOVE small/minimal spaces - but…
Somehow most people living in dense cities make do with a small amount of space. For example it's not uncommon to find 300sq ft apartments in Manhattan. Some people even manage to raise kids in such space. Look at places like Hong Kong and similar where small units are the norm and yet people seem to be able to live with the issues you mention.
Re: Architect's Dream House: Less Than 200 Square Feet
#30The subreddit /r/tinyhouses has lots of this sort of thing, and is a pretty good collation of various blogs and articles on the subject, with some pretty decent conversation.