Small Spaces etc. - Life is short

Small Spaces etc. - Casa Kids, furniture for smaller bodies

Better utilization of space is the underlying theme of a smaller footprint in our homes and lifestyles. We've also made the obvious connection of economic value in reducing square footage of homes and apartments.

Today we feature an Argentinian designer, Alberto Gil, who has designed for kids for the last 20 years.

Casa Kids by Roberto Gil from Roberto Gil on Vimeo.

Here's how Casa Kids describes the project:

Roberto has manipulated the relatively small space to create an environment where the two sisters who share it can enjoy private and common space in equal measure, imparting a powerful sense of autonomy for each sister. They both enjoy a private area for sleep and study, as well as their own nooks and niches, scaled specifically to their smaller frames and shorter vantage points. Providing the sisters with a sense of privacy and belonging, while still allowing them to come together in the central area that’s created by the symmetrical staircases that surround it, is the chief accomplishment of this design.

In addition to effectively creating two rooms within a room, the design is a powerhouse in terms of storage. Roberto has built deep
drawers into each bed, in addition to the drawers that double as stairs within the identical staircases. The room also features endless shelving and a three-tier closet that stands more than nine feet high. The U-shaped staircases offer increased safety as children climb up and down, as well as make it easy for parents to access their children’s beds when it’s time for laundry, bedtime stories or cozying up next to sleepy faces.

Roberto has dubbed the design an example of
“Children’s Architecture” because of the way it mimics large-scale architecture on kid-size terms.

via Apartment Therapy

Small Spaces etc. - Art & Architecture - Hospitality Revenue - Eco Education

Connecting some of Encinitas passions (and economy options) of art, environment, education, gardens, sustainability, tourism, hospitality, beach and community character; there is a reoccurring idea that visits every time I hear about Pacific View site. That is the idea of having accommodations for trying out eco living options; that is, how to live lightly on the land.  It seems a good fit with education and ecology with a built in revenue generating plan.

But, this caterpillar shaped pod by Nomadic Resorts design team seemed to link the art world with its beautiful natural aesthetic.  As the Treehugger post where I found this concept suggests, it is idealistic and escapist, but that can spell attractive for a tourist experience sought by some with lots of money but little experience with simple green living.  The appeal would be a small but very expensive hospitality venue overlooking the Pacific Ocean in the heart of a beach community's active art community.  Here are some of the details to describe the pods, called "the Looper", from the designers' website:

The Looper is a luxury pod inspired by the form of a caterpillar. The orthogonal structure uses a small volume of structural material to enclose a large internal volume in translucent fabric. The recycleable membrane flysheet lasts for decades, withstands the harshest environmental conditions, emits no volatile organic compounds and glows like a firefly at night.

LIGHTNESS

Each pre-fabricated product is designed for disassembly so that the units can be taken to pieces, packed into containers and shipped to a different location as and when required, Resorts and camps can change places to provide new, exciting experiences in destinations where conventional construction would be impossible.

LUXERY COMFORTS

The Looper is a 40m2 [430 sf] air conditioned resort villa that harvests rainwater, produces and stores solar energy and treats its own waste water.

The unit includes a fully functioning en-suite bathroom with solar hot water, a generously proportioned changing room, an air-conditioned sleeping area, a desk area and an outdoor living deck the roof of which can be opened and closed at the flick of a switch.

SPACE

The pod is perfectly proportioned for a luxurious break…the internal dimensions
are 10m long, 4m wide with a 3 m ceiling height [33 x 13 x10] and generous space for circulation. In addition the pod provides excellent privacy, acoustic insulation and it is protected against unwanted guests (such as mosquitoes)

CHILL 

The hammock chill-out area has a dual purpose…in the day it is a great place to sunbathe, read a book, watch the wildlife or sip a beer but at night the retractable roof can be pulled down, the LCD projector ignited and the area is transformed into a cozy cinema experience where you enjoy your favorite film with a glass of wine.

Okay, that last bit was pretty corny. But, regardless of this exact product which - full disclaimer that EYNU has no financial arrangement - is sourced in Europe, is meant for inspiration. Of course the concept is filled with local code hurdles beyond the biggest obstacle for all of us in Encinitas - who will own the land and how will it be financed?

The ability to dismantle and move these structures means sharing the site over a calendar year may require intense tourist focus at some points, children's exposure at another and overlapping use like art and garden use throughout the year.

This concept invites discussion of a diverse list of community interests coming together, along with the city of Encinitas to envision disparate yet linked interests and values. The self-sufficient living pods, luxery edition, are a way of keeping the numbers and footprints very small, but revenues large. And, very rich tourist will have a good story to tell.

Best of all, this is one small space offers a means of shifting away from consumption of stuff to investing in the offering of unique life experiences and valuable life learning that once practiced no one and nothing can take from another.

Small Spaces etc. - A Person's A Person No Matter How Small

 La Jolla has been on my shit list this year because Mitt Romney's abode and yesterday's news of Drone central abides there.  But, lest I forget, La Jolla was the home of Dr. Seuss who brought us many tales with simple truths.  As I struggle to be an advocate, an ally for the disenfranchised, the marginalized, the invisible, the small . . . . "Horton Hears a Who" comes to mind.

We are here, we are here, we are here - music to the ears.

Small Spaces etc. - Small Minded

because the unexamined life is not worth living . . .

From independent Science writer Paul Wallis an Op Ed last summer: 

"If you’ve ever been inflicted with a really selfish person, seen the pettiness and the immaturity, “small minded” is one of the more natural, if much too polite, descriptions. It seems selfish people actually do have a smaller part of the brain.

A recent study has shown that the part of the brain related to altruism reacts very differently when comparing altruistic and genuinely selfish people. The real altruist’s brain only starts reacting to expense at very high levels, where the selfish brain goes nuts well before those levels."

Science Daily: 

To investigate whether differences in altruistic behavior have neurobiological causes, volunteers were to divide money between themselves and an anonymous other person. The participants always had the option of sacrificing a certain portion of the money for the benefit of the other person. Such a sacrifice can be deemed altruistic because it helps someone else at one's own expense. The researchers found major differences in this respect: Some participants were almost never willing to sacrifice money to benefit others while others behaved very altruistically. 

More gray matter
The aim of the study, however, was to find out why there are such differences. Previous studies had shown that a certain region of the brain -- the place where the parietal and temporal lobes meet -- is linked to the ability to put oneself in someone else's shoes in order to understand their thoughts and feelings. 

Altruism is probably closely related to this ability. Consequently, the researchers suspected that individual differences in this part of the brain might be linked to differences in altruistic behavior. And, according to Yosuke Morishima, a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Economics at the University of Zurich, they were right: "People who behaved more altruistically also had a higher proportion of gray matter at the junction between the parietal and temporal lobes."

One of the goals for the Small Spaces etc. series was to raise awareness about the tiny house movement specifically as an alternative housing type for affordability options within Encinitas.  More generally it was to demonstrate to those who see housing like their own as the only "normal" option for the community.  The ability to empathize and appreciate outcomes other than yes/no, up/down, black/white, rich/poor, me/you self involvement is lost on many community people - on camera and in print. It is disheartening.

This study cited in the op ed here was an attempt to understand what differentiates these behaviors.  It is vital in building community, investing in the commons and promoting resilience to be able to serve all the people. This actually includes those who don't live in a single family residence. It also includes those who desire more density for safety, value, comradery, convenience as well as those who have to leave town due to financial or employment downturns.  This affects the young, the middle-aged, some with families and the elderly. This affects those who thought they were secure in a well paying job with all the health insurance they thought they might need.

The chart illustrates a bit of local background information to help clarify why this is important.

A key finding regarding housing affordability in San Diego County published by Equinox Center Regional Dashboard showed Encinitas had the stingiest number with tiny Del Mar the only community with fewer affordable options.

With all of the speeches about how none of the General Plan Update drafts, reports, studies and strategies really give "real" affordable options, there is a stunning lack of words devoted to "real" solutions.  Only the city council have offered some ideas.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING IS A REAL PROBLEM!

BTW - Equinox Center is moving out of Encinitas within the week.  "Greener" Pastures? Great organization we can still access via the internet.

But to return to the op ed on the brain study regarding the gray matter between the parietal and temporal lobes . . .

This part of the brain apparently reacts to values in relation to self-interest. [ . . . ] Extrapolate for a moment, and you can see some rather familiar behavioural and relationship issues. Altruistic and selfish people can find each other incomprehensible. Ask some people to help the poor or the starving, and you might as well be speaking another language. Truly altruistic people, on the other hand, seem to see nothing even mildly worrying about going into a war zone to do aid work. 

Small minded? Yes, but with some obvious qualifiers. Risk and reward are also survival strategies, and this social culture doesn’t exactly encourage altruism. Quite the opposite, in fact, it encourages selfishness. 

Another study found that it was possible to measure altruism/selfishness quite effectively, and it actually supports the Zurich study:

Science Daily, again: 

Individuals who excel at understanding others' intents and beliefs are more altruistic than those who struggle at this task. The ability to understand others' perspectives has previously been associated with activity in a brain region known as the temporoparietal junction (TPJ). Based on these past findings, Fehr and his team reasoned that the size and activation of the TPJ would relate to individual differences in altruism. 

In the new study, subjects underwent a brain imaging scan and played a game in which they had to decide how to split money between themselves and anonymous partners. Subjects who made more generous decisions had a larger TPJ in the right hemisphere of the brain compared with subjects who made stingy decisions.

The study showed a rising level of risk with decisions to give $10, $100, $1000 or $10,000 causing people quite naturally to turn away from sharing as the amounts got higher, no surprise there. What is dramatic is that the selfish proved stingy at the first $10.  The altruistic might not have the $1,000 but would be willing to help raise that kind of money.

Writer Wallis explains the point of this is core research into how the brain works, like the research on left brain/right brain studies and others.  His own interest is more specific. And EYNU is interested for similar reasons that lie beyond even our local political climate.  The miserable behavior nationwide is a real concern and it generates a great deal of frustrated anger.  My own suspicion is that this rage against corporate news stories of national poster boys for selfish behavior seeps into our community conversations.

What interests me is that we apparently have two different brain morphologies, with totally different reactions, quite unalike. There’s been a lot of talk lately about “polarization”. What seems to be happening is that the default reactions of people’s brains are geared to behaviours, and those behaviours, on the social level, are mutually exclusive.

Real altruists, like army combat medics, aid workers, and a range of other quite selfless people, coexist on the same planet, very incompatibly, with corporate sycophants, stooges, and utterly selfish people. You’d have to bolt down the altruists to prevent them risking their lives, and you have to point a gun at selfish people for them to even think about spending a cent on a charity.

Are there different types of human? One kind self-obsessed, the other almost saintlike? Historically, the answer is yes. Fearless altruists have been documented for thousands of years, as have the ultra-greedy and ultra-selfish. 

Each does what they think is natural. They understand their motives and never question them. The altruists are admirable by any standards, but can be reckless and utterly uncomprehending of dangers and quite intolerant of the fears and reservations of others. They can be naïve, and assume everyone else shares their values. Their very high social value is that they actively support the survival of others.

The selfish can be utterly contemptible, despicable, and downright criminal. There’s not much to like about the selfish people, but it has to be admitted that they always find ways of surviving themselves, however disgusting. [ . . . ]

“Social” intelligence?

Society, too, is faced with a reality- Selfishness based cultures and societies historically have a very high failure rate. They’re anti-social societies. My personal usage description of selfish people is “brain blind”. They simply do not/will not see the advantages of a society which isn’t in a state of constant conflict with itself. They don’t see why it’s better to share costs, for example, rather than forcing people to pay higher prices for services. 

Reading a study which indicates that they’re also physically deficient does explain quite a bit. What the brain can’t or won’t process does show the logic very effectively. Selfish people aren’t stupid about their own interests, far from it, but they’re absolute idiots objectively in any social sense. Altruists can be infuriating, and some of them refuse to address either practicalities or the sensitivities of others. [ . . . ]

As a great advocate for Small, this is one area where Big is better. If we can recruit more altruistic people into our community's civic life, educate more young people to humanist perspectives and support the mayor, council members, city staff and activists who possess flexible, inclusive thinking  - we have a reason to care.

Small Spaces etc. - 040113

Here It Is (The Small House Portlandia Video) from Dawn Jones on Vimeo.

Small Spaces etc.: Traditional Cottages

"Lets face it: humans are gregarious —we like to live around others. We also have a desire—and perhaps a need—for personal space. Sometime in the last generation, however, we became so charmed with the dream of a ‘house of one’s own’ that we overshot our desire for privacy, leaving us marooned on our own personal island in a sea of houses."
—Ross Chapin

Cottages don't seem like a real stretch in a Southern California beach community that purportedly values its traditions. But where are the developments for this kind of building? What is stopping this? Is it greed, nimby terror of density, lack of imagination, building codes or something else responsible? It is time to bring cottages back into a beach community.

Ross Chapin Architects is one of the well-known names for this genre and is credited with the term "pocket neighborhoods." Within the Pocket Neighborhoods blog is the following:

In essence, pocket neighborhoods are about nearby neighbors sharing and caring for common ground. 

These communities don’t have to be built from scratch, or take much money at all. Section Four in the Pocket Neighborhoods book features a story about two subdivisions where residents have taken down their backyard fences to create a safe play-space for their kids. Another story tells about a suburban cul-de-sac where neighbors regularly take over the street for summer potlucks. In Baltimore and Los Angeles, residents along urban alleys have reclaimed their access lane as a shared commons, complete with BBQs, picnic tables and container gardens. And all over America, nearby neighbors are coming together to plan community gardens in vacant lots and undeveloped street right-of-ways.

New pocket neighborhoods can take the form of clustered homes around a garden in a variety of configurations in small towns or suburban settings. In urban settings, pocket neighborhoods are likely to be attached or stacked apartments opening onto a shared courtyard. This is because the higher value of urban land will force denser development. Cohousing is another form of pocket neighborhood that is becoming more common, but that will be for another blog post.

Style is not what matters; homes could take the form of Craftsman cottages, contemporary sheds, or urban lofts. Nor is location — suburban, urban, small town. It’s all about the essential pattern: having a relatively small number of neighbors gathering around shared space.

Small Spaces etc. - What is stopping this movement?

The following portions of an article by Lloyd Alter of Treehugger, citing The Tiny Life blogger, address barriers to the Tiny House Movement. The original is recommended, especially for the many informative comments.

The obstacles are all related to the free market system that has shaped our communities.  The model that once worked well is broken.  The excesses, financial bubbles and draconian building codes are all aspects of the barriers to choosing small (read: affordable) spaces. The article follows . . .

Notwithstanding the success of people like Jay Shafer and his Tumbleweed Tiny House line, it is still an incredibly tiny niche. What's holding it back? Over at The Tiny Life, Ryan Mitchell lists the Top 5 Biggest Barriers To The Tiny House Movement; the first three L's are well known to me, I am not certain about the last two, and I think he is missing a big one. 

Land 

One of the largest hurdles for people wanting to live in a Tiny House is access to land. Land is expensive, in growing short supply and people want a balance of having land and being close to city or town centers where they can access services, entertainment and employment. 

One of the main reasons people are interested in tiny houses is that they are relatively cheap. Once you try to buy land, it's not anymore, and the actual tiny house becomes the least expensive part of the equation. 

Loans 

At this point, banks don’t feel that Tiny Houses are a viable option because they don’t have a good resale value. 

There are loans available for recreational vehicles and trailers, but the interest rate is high and you have to provide personal security. If you can plop it on the ground that you own, then you might be able to get a traditional mortgage, but don't bet on it. 

Laws 

This one is the real killer; many municipalities have minimum square footage requirements because they like the higher tax assessments. Even where I am now deep in the middle of nowhere, they have them. They insist on full water and sewer systems that can cost more than the house. They don't allow trailers so you can't just leave it on the chassis. They don't want tiny houses, period. 

Social Pressures 

In our society today, bigger is better, more is better, we are conditioned to want more and more stuff. These cultural norms are a very strong current in maintaining the status quo. Tiny Houses fly in the face of such things, questioning much of what people hold dear. 

This is fundamentally where I think Ryan, and much of the movement, goes wrong. Lots of people all over the world live in tiny houses; they are called apartments. Families all over Europe and Asia are raised in a couple of hundred square feet, and single people have no problem with it. In cities like Vancouver, tiny houses are popping up in back lanes everywhere. But much of the Tiny House movement seems to be about replacing a conventional suburban or exurban model with... a tiny house. 

Fear 

When faced with the prospect of bucking the system, initiating a radical lifestyle change, and spending a good chunk of money to do it, it can be scary.

Encinitas has not found any substantive solutions to housing for working class, underemployed residents who represent the largest labor pool in the community. We all know that Density Bonus Laws are a sham for real solutions. Public land trusts as an investment for citizens and the city are worth exploring along with micro-loans, a thorough review of existing building code constraints and green building grants. These all represent steps towards considering solutions.

All it takes is will. There are individuals and families who have taken on these obstacles individually. But, there is a segment of the community most vulnerable and most in need of assistance from community activists, community groups and the many citizens aware of land use inequities. Greater numbers and cooperative strategies would give Encinitas a chance to venture into this new housing approach. It just needs our humanity to kick in to mobilize such a movement.

For me the great appeal beyond conscious living is the end run around developers we have grown to abhor, the big bankers, large building industry firms and the affordable housing giants who all act as paracites in the process.  Who then would be forcing Density Bonus? If we can get our city government, city planners to work as advocates for the citizenry rather than handmaidens to the Bigs, we can begin our ventures into something altogether new. First and foremost we need to get the rigid (broken) State (and/or Federal) Housing Authorities to certify tiny homes and then get city building codes to recognize exceptions.

Small Spaces etc. - Recycle, Reclaim, Reimagine Home

Small Space etc. - Intimate planting

Nature on a global scale is one thing, like the Amazon rain forest or our national parks. Thinking locally isn't too hard. Our community finally has an Urban Forest Manual and we have wonderfully vigilant neighborhoods protecting our historic trees. Our schools are planting trees all the time. This writer is putting in a backyard orchard, but the kind of fantasy images that excite are far more intimate, more tactile.

What follows are some provocative prototypes by designers from around the world. This isn't a DIY post or a linked piece for depth. It is merely to spark thought. Could you live this intimately with plant life? We know it has been proven that our indoor air is healthier with plants, test show stress reduction and the beauty is undeniable. Enjoy . . .

You might prefer fish to eels in this aguaponic coffee table setup.  This furniture photo is reminiscent of the 1982 science fiction Blade Runner movie.

Small Spaces etc. - High End Sustainability

Another example of using really high end products, materials, finishes and design talent is shown in this home.

This is also the first reference we have made to the obstacles within the tiny house movement faced in municipal planning. This subject of the tiny home in zoning laws and building codes will be explored further in this series.

And another video showing more features of this mini-home . . .

Small Spaces etc. - Micro Minimal

This week the most minimal of small spaces to date. The first is called One-Sqm-House. This one square meter (10 square feet) dwelling is an architect's prototype. This clip is via Alex at Tiny House Talk, whose tag line is "small spaces more freedom."

When I first saw this I thought of past competitions for architects and designers to produce temporary, emergency and homeless shelter.

The examples below are from one of these competitions 5 years ago. I've since lost the proper links to the source. Whoops.

There is a kind of hierarchy within the homeless population.  There are those who have found temporary shelter within homes of family or friends, those who have an RV or car, those who have vouchers for temporary shelter and those simply fending for themselves on the street.  Despite the most common picture of a homeless person being like the Banksy illustration at the beginning of this post or the guy above, it is women with children who are in fact the most vulnerable of homeless population. 

The Babes of Wrath are two women, Diane Nilan and Pat LaMarche, who travel around the country and work with homeless children and families. You can follow their EPIC Journey (Everyday People In Crisis) here. They are interviewed here on the Young Turks.

Recently the homeless were counted in San Diego County, a local girl mounted a blanket distribution project for the homeless in memory of her uncle and housing strategies for lowest income has presumably been the subject of several years of General Planning Update citizen participation. 

Aternet is currently running a series on the poor. Part 1's recent article, 2 Years in Jail for Sitting on a Milk Crate? The Shocking Ways America Punishes Poor People Living on the Street (Hard Times, USA) haunted me. I know from experience how few places there are to sit while walking in Encinitas. We aren't alone. Laws all over the country are designed solely to target the homeless. There are better solutions. 

Part 2 is titled Hard Times, USA: Would You Consider Thinking Differently About Poverty and Poor and Homeless People? A huge number of Americans feel vulnerable every day of every week, their future unknown. What are you going to do about it? Both of these are really excellent articles and are recommended. The rest of this powerful series Hard Times USA is at Alternet this month.

There is one simple response (as the video illustrated) for what is the most important thing one could spend money on for the homeless? Houses. Simple but not easy to incorporate in our community dialog.

Small Spaces etc. - Trying On Tiny

This week's Small Spaces is an introduction to one couples' blog called Trying On Tiny wherein they chronicle their experience of living in a tiny home. They introduce themselves in this way:

Audrey Addison: 

She moved to Portland, OR 7 years ago and has recently decided to ‘try on’ a tiny home and to embrace a simpler way to live in the world. She feels lucky to have the support of family and friends and feels even luckier to have a partner who shares her dream. She’s a lover of nature, learning, and bikes.

Tomas Quinones:

Recently turned freelance illustrator with a focus on children’s literature, Tomas became interested in tiny houses and simplifying his life after leaving an unfulfilling IT job in 2008. Since then he started ditching the unimportant stuff in his life and focusing more on experiences rather than collecting.

From the beginning this past fall, Audrey writes candidly about the stress, struggles and disappointment with the contractor and the mismatch of what they got compared with what they thought they would be getting for a tiny home. Tomas' illustrates this in his own way.

At the beginning of January the couple details the things they love. Tomas begins:

What do I love most about living in my Tiny House? Audrey may share many of these sentiments, but I thought I’d share my own opinion.

• Simple & Cozy
• Owning Less Stuff
• We Own It
• We Can Modify It
• It’s Brought Out My Inner Bob Vila
• Using Fewer Resources
• Peace & Quiet
• Frugal Living
• Clean-up is Quick
• It’s Everything I Need, Nothing More 

Things I love Part II

Great idea, Tomas! Here are the top things that I LOVE about living in our tiny home.

• In-line With My Beliefs, Values, and Ideals
• Tomas’s Inner Bob Villa
• Community Support
• Mindfulness
• Home Ownership
• Closeness to Nature
• Cozy, Quiet, and Quick to Clean
• Changeable
• Helpful to Others
• A Good Start

They both delve deeper into what they mean here with the kind of detail they've laid out their entire experience. It is an entertaining read.

Encinitas would be the perfect community to build an eco-living village that could include tiny homes on wheels, among other alternatives for small space living, as an eco-tourist experience. Special rates for Encinitas residents to try on this kind of lifestyle for size? Above all we have the perfect setting for a lifestyle that encourages living outside as the preferred pattern, a pattern that can't be enjoyed in the colder climates.

Small Spaces etc. - Economic Necessity

Not everyone who lives in a tiny home came by that lifestyle as first or best choice.  The Jordon family left a 2,500 sf home to life in a 320 sf shotgun tiny house because the man of the house lost his job. This couple and their teenage son live mortgage free next to their family business. In the following video we learn that the change in thinking (mental prep) took 5 years.

Unlike most of the previous examples, this family is very conventional in design choices. The furniture, possessions, equipment all seem to be minor variations from suburban sized norm.

Jordan says,

I don’t know if everybody could make this decision. I highly recommend it. I sleep every night really, really good. We never discuss money. It’s not a topic that comes up. Our life is much more peaceful now. I have learned to cultivate contentment. I’m not thinking about what I want to buy next or how I can increase my earnings. I’m content. I’m very happy and there’s a lot to be said for that.

Source: Grist

Small Spaces Etc. - Life Edited

Graham Hill, editor of Treehugger, held a contest. Through crowdsourcing  he received 300 design entries for this "life edited" apartment. Two Romanian architecture students' design were selected and this final design is based largely on their entry.

Top of the line, latest technology, spare no expense for the best features make this an inspired space.

 Gizmodo on Vimeo.

Here are some of the features:

• A moving shelf that divides the room into bedroom and guest room.
• Fold-down bunk beds for guests.
• A Murphy bed that, when folded up, is a functional shelf.
• A telescoping dinner table that can seat 10.
• Refrigerator, freezer, and induction stovetop hidden neatly away in drawers.
• More closet space than you’d get in a much larger apartment.

Here is the Life Edited concept:

Small Spaces etc. - One by One by One

In a beach community accessory units are no surprise.  And, it is important to survival for many that these homes remain a part of the shadow economy because local, state and national laws emphatically impose constraints that do more harm than good for actual people, especially the most vulnerable of the working class and middle class.  This is a look at the great need that these small spaces satisfy and leave the legal constraints for another day. From Grist a quick peek at a couple of options, but the original post shows a whole range for living large in small houses.

Jon and Ryah Dietzen moved from their 1,500-square-foot home to a 400-square-foot cottage with two toddlers. They made the move for its financial freedom, but the benefits didn’t stop there. “We realized after a few months how much time, freedom, and peace we were gaining by not collecting and spending our time taking care of more ‘stuff,’” Jon Dietzen told me. By choosing a smaller house, they found a better balance between work and home life.

Here is the “before” shot.

A lot in a small space: kitchen island, living room, and a bedroom behind a curtain.

Small homes combat neighborhood decline brought on by shrinking household sizes. Adding people can revitalize a neighborhood, allowing schools to stay open, giving neighborhood businesses more customers, making transit service cost-effective, and saving on infrastructure costs. Infilling neighborhoods with backyard cottages helps add more people to a neighborhood, without altering its character. 

As homeowners build small dwellings, they provide lower-cost housing within the existing fabric of their neighborhood, with no government support necessary. Vancouver’s planning director, Brent Toderian, sees this as the essential value of the trend towards small homes: “[It’s] about ordinary people. Thousands of individual homeowners can do it, one by one by one. It’s publicly propelled, not corporate-propelled, densification. It’s gradual. It’s discreet. It’s green.” [ed.emphasis]

Now that many cities have figured out backyard cottage rules, they face a new challenge: dealing with homes even tinier than the typical accessory dwelling. Some cities’ regulations set minimum size requirements for dwellings. Others say a recreational vehicle can’t count as an accessory dwelling unit, which means “you can camp in your little house, but not live in it,” writes Dee Williams. Tiny houser Lina Menard suggests that “people should have the right to a tiny house as long as it accommodates their needs and desires.” But for people to exercise that right, cities will have to rethink the zoning rules that stand in the way of tiny homes.

Dee Williams is well known to many since the uploading of the following video clip in 2008 and shown in the corporate media many times since.

Dee Williams decided to rethink her American Dream after building a school in Guatemala and having a close friend get cancer made her reevaluate her priorities. “He was getting sicker and sicker, and I didn’t have the time or the money to really throw myself into helping him. I was spending a lot of time and money on my house. So the house was the easiest thing to try to get rid of,” Williams told Yes! magazine. So she sold her 1,500-square-foot Portland home and built an 84-square-foot tiny home for $10,000. Now she lives without a mortgage, giving her the time and money to invest in her friends and community.

Via Grist

Whoops! this became a 2 for 1 post day by accident. Accidentally got some posting dates wrong. Enjoy.

Small Spaces etc. - Teenager Builds a Tiny House

Kirstin Dirksen filmed Austin Hay when he was mid-project building the tiny home he started at age 16.  She returns at different stages until it's completion in his senior year, September 2012.

For more about Austin and photographs of his process, visit Inhabitat design blog for an interview with the young builder at the beginning of this project.

Small Spaces etc. - Introduction

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion."
— Henry David Thoreau

Live deep and suck out all the marrow of life is a great Waldenesque way to think about the Tiny House movement of this past decade. Some of us live this lifestyle of small space and others find it an intriguing mental challenge.  Either way, there are now so many wonderful examples around the world it seems Encinitas You Need Us should make this a weekly item.

Housing has been in the news and in the political center of the last campaign year.  Yet absent from the discussion is much talk of small houses and other alternatives to the dominant single family residence that is nowhere affordable for a growing number of residents. There is a Kirstin Dirksen full length documentary - on YouTube here - that is really fascinating. The following is a shorter version as a good introduction to the Tiny House Movement.