Archinect - News

Hello Wood creates airplane-inspired tiny home for an ambitious 12-year-old client

2023-02-14T12:48:00-05:00

Budapest-based Hello Wood has completed what it describes as “its most charming and eccentric small house ever.” Named the Jet House, the project comprises of a cottage shaped like a pastel blue airplane, set within a ring of trees in the hills of Hungary.

The project was initiated by an undaunted 12-year-old client named Lujzi, who dreamed of a playhouse she could retreat to with her friends. From Lujzi’s vision, the design team emerged with a functional tiny house which, in their words, is “more reminiscent of a beautiful design toy than a building.”

Image credit: Zsuzsa Darab

“Lujzi has always enjoyed traveling - especially flying on aircraft, which is why she had an airplane-themed cabin in her dreams,” Hello Wood explains. “She arrived at the first meetings with elaborate ideas and plans on paper. Supported by his father, she followed the design process till its end – representing an excitingly different perspective from that of typical real estate developers.”

Image credit: Zsu...

Crossboundaries converted a motorboat into a flexible tiny home on the water

2022-12-30T14:07:00-05:00

Earlier this year, Beijing-based practice Crossboundaries redesigned a fully solar powered motorboat by adding tiny-home components making it a slow-moving home on the water.

Completed in March 2022 for a Berlin-based client, the project questions the relationships between the notions of public-private and temporary-permanent. The structure has an overall length of around 49 feet and a maximum width of a little over 13 feet. It features a set of interlinked and multi-purpose spaces.

Crossboundaries made functionality improvements to the boat by including a fully hidden bed and the ability to close the helmstand, which hides more technical equipment, freeing up space. They also featured a pop-up table for the kitchen and a hidden foldable desk within a cabinet.

As noted by the architects, “The boat is "smart and self-powered" due to a set of innovative solutions in terms of solar energy, heating source, water, and waste management.” On sunny days, the boat can be entirely powered b...

New prefabricated tiny house can be assembled in an hour for less than $40,000

2022-12-05T15:22:00-05:00

A Los Angeles-based tiny house startup named Vika Living has unveiled a compact, semi-permanent housing unit that it says can be set up in an hour for just under $40,000.

Called the Vika One, the fully prefabricated dwellings provide 144 square feet of living space, with a shared sleeping, living, dining, kitchen area, and separate bathroom. Its ceilings stand 8.5 feet tall, paired with a floor-to-ceiling glass wall and a 42-square-foot outdoor terrace.

The tiny house is also delivered complete with furnishings and fixtures, including a bed, table, chairs, toilet, kitchen, storage units, and mechanical systems for HVAC, water, power, and waste. There is also an off-grid model, which includes rooftop solar panels and batteries, fresh water pumping and filtration, and off-grid waste systems.

Image: Vika Living

The units are fully assembled in Vika Living’s Los Angeles factory and then delivered and installed on site. No foundations or heavy equipment are needed to set them up.

The ...

Liv-Connected launches a modular approach to home design and a solution to the growing housing shortage

2022-08-22T16:09:00-04:00

New York startup Liv-Connected has released a modular approach to housing that tackles the homebuilding market's material and skilled labor shortages and limited housing inventory.

Cofounded by architects Jordan Rogove, Wayne Norbeck, Joe Wheeler, and healthcare professional Dr. Herb Rogove in 2019 (Jordan Rogove and Wayne Norbeck are also cofounders of NYC-based architecture firm DXA Studio), the endeavor aimed to seek a solution to disaster-relief housing that embodied a sense of permanence and resulted in an affordable, sustainable, and high-quality, health-centered solution to homebuilding.

Image courtesy of Liv-Connected.

The emergence of Liv-Connected reflects the commitment to homeowners' health and wellness and their team of architects and healthcare providers. "We started with the assumption that disaster housing could be so thoughtful that it might become permanent," shared Norbeck during a conversation with Forbes' Jennifer Castenson. "We were interested in the possibil...

A highly-flexible Manhattan apartment, designed by Martin Hopp

2022-06-06T18:38:00-04:00

New York City-based architecture firm Martin Hopp has completed the renovation of a 720-square-foot basement in Manhattan into a flexible and hyper-functional living and working space.

Located in a 1930s building in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood, the garden-level apartment was in need of major structural repairs. Its original layout and features made by being below grade gave the apartment a subterranean feel that limited natural daylight. Thus, the renovation aimed to introduce more “light, joy, and purpose” into the space.

Image: Fei Liu

As per the architects: “The new apartment uses a flexible targeted design, elevates simple materials, and carefully-proportioned spaces to raise the residents' quality of life.” Adaptable features including folding and pivoting doors, a rotating table, counter-balanced spring mechanisms, and multiple forms of storage enhance the flexibility of the space.

Image: Fei Liu

A palette of white materials and white oak paneling establish a sense of br...

Winners of the 2021 AIA Small Project Awards announced

2021-06-25T12:11:00-04:00

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has unveiled the eleven winning projects for the 2021 edition of the AIA Small Projects Awards. Now in its eighteenth year, the awards were established by the Small Project Design (SPD) Knowledge Community to “recognize small-project practitioners for the high quality of their work.” The initiative also seeks to raise awareness of the value and excellence that architects can apply to projects regardless of size, brief, or scope.

The eleven winners are spread across three categories. Below, we have set out the winning entries, along with a description excerpt. For full details on the winning projects, visit the AIA’s official website here. You can also recap previous winners of the Small Project Awards through our coverage in 2020 and 2019.

Category 1

Small project construction, an architectural object, work of environmental art or an architectural design element that costs up to $150,000 in construction.

Casa de Baño (Bathhouse), Temasca...

This mushroom-shaped nature retreat offers panoramic vistas

2021-04-02T15:23:00-04:00

Strolling through the woods outside of Xin Yu City in China's eastern Jiangxi Province, one might stumble across a peculiar little cottage: shaped like a cone dropped from one of the surrounding pine trees and sitting slightly elevated from the forest floor, the dwelling begins to blur the line between nature and fabricated shelter.

Photo: Fanfang Tian.

Dubbed The Mushroom, the 50-square-meter (538 square feet) house is composed of two basic, intersecting volumes: "The main part of the mushroom is the guest room space, with a panoramic window set up near the viewing height," as the project description explains. "When sitting on chairs or leaning on the bed, the guests are immersed in the surrounding nature."

Photo: Fanfang Tian.

"The loft serves as a child area, linked by the small-scale stairs. The pure white cone-shaped roof is rounded on top, creating a sense of unbounded extension to the space."

Photo: Fanfang Tian.

"The bathroom and storage ...

Tiny homes take off in Denver, with one caveat

2019-10-11T14:30:00-04:00

The Denver City Council voted Monday night to approve changes to the city’s zoning code to help welcome temporary tiny home villages hoping to use vacant land to help address homelessness...The city voted to approve the Beloved Community Village. According to the release, it was Denver’s first temporary tiny home village and is a successful pilot of using tiny homes to help vulnerable or marginalized residents aiming to find permanent homes.

"In residential zone districts, these villages must be located on the grounds of a public, civic or institutional use, such as a school, church or community center," Fox reports. The tiny home villages will be able to remain in these locations temporarily for up to four years, it is a creative approach to the problem of homelessness in major cities. Based on the outcome it will be interesting to see if more will follow.

Tiny homes are fitting symbols of economic precarity

2019-02-12T14:38:00-05:00

Tiny houses are promoted as an answer to the affordable housing crisis; a desirable alternative to traditional homes and mortgages. Yet there are many complexities and contradictions that surround these tiny spaces, as I discovered when I began investigating them.

There is something inherently romantic about the nomadic lifestyle cooked up in the 1960's, exemplified by the VW van and the desert campfire. While this relic of America's recent past became, undoubtedly, the inspiration for the Tiny Home movement in recent years, the reasons for its current popularity do not match those of its precedent.

Interior of Elm, by Tumbleweed, Tiny House Company

Megan Carras "toured homes, attended tiny house festivals, stayed in a tiny house community, and interviewed several dozen people who live in them" to reach a discover that there is more to their wide spread use than popularly imagined. Tiny homes are, as Carras makes evident, a sign of economic precarity - one particularly felt by the millennial generation.

"All the tiny-houser millennials that I interviewed wanted to own bigger houses in the future," Carras reports. "They saw tiny living as a means of owning something now and being able to save at the same time. Several young couples planned to ...

Cruise ships, tenements, drainpipes: Hong Kong's housing crisis inspires creative design approaches

2018-03-27T14:03:00-04:00

For eight years in a row, an international survey of nearly 300 cities has named Hong Kong the world’s least affordable housing market. [...] Architects and developers have also put forward some novel proposals, ranging from the quirky to the audacious. While some of the ideas may be repackaged versions of the cramped spaces the city has long known, others could reshape the future of housing in Hong Kong.

The proposal by architect James Law to squeeze 100-square-foot micro apartments into concrete drainpipes was widely published a few weeks ago. The NYT lists a few more 'solutions' — some lofty, others being already implemented.

This 100 sq. ft micro-living unit made from concrete pipes is Hong Kong's newest housing solution

2018-01-02T13:08:00-05:00

The goal with it is simple, says architect James Law: to utilize “leftover space” between buildings in Hong Kong, a city with limited land and a constant housing shortage.

The city of Hong Kong has retained the title of the world's most expensive real estate market for the past seven years. As housing prices continue to soar, many residents are finding themselves with inadequate shelter, including over 200,000 people living in what has come to be referred to as 'coffin homes,' or tiny, subdivided housing units measuring at just 4' x 6'.

Aiming to ease the city's affordable housing problem, architect James Law has found a creative solution that converts concrete water pipes into 100-square-foot micro-living units. Called OPod, the tiny apartments are equipped with a shower, toilet, and smartphone lock, and can house one to two people. Additionally, the tube houses can also be stacked on one another between the city’s highrises to form modular communities.

Tiny, cartoonish homes by artist Richard Woods pop up in British seaside town

2017-08-25T15:12:00-04:00

For his latest project, Holiday Home – part of this year’s Folkestone Triennial (2 Sept to 5 Nov) – Woods has created six colorful bungalows, situated in unexpected locations around the town.

Richard Woods is known for his architectural installations that feature colorful, geometric patterns and playful decorative facades. For his latest project, the UK artist has installed six tiny, cartoon-like homes across the town of Folkestone.

In his interview with the Guardian, the artist explained the idea of the project came from visiting the seaside town and receiving a "strange leaflet saying, 'Have you thought about turning your property into cash?'" He goes on the explain, "the idea grew out of that: to make six identical bungalows and install some in very desirable locations, some not, but keeping it very open-ended."

Sadiq Khan to invest £25m to bring 1,000 'Pocket Homes' to London

2017-08-24T04:00:00-04:00

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has announced that the city will be investing £25 million into constructing over 1,000 affordable prefab apartments. Funding from the city will go into purchasing small brownfield sites that will then be built on by Pocket Living, a developer specializing in 400-square-foot modular apartments. The apartments will go to first-time home buyers, already living in the relevant borough, and will be sold roughly 20% below market rate. The initiative also ensures that the Pocket homes remain affordable for the lifetime of the building. The new homes are expected for completion by 2021.

Upon making the announcement, the Mayor acknowledged his commitment to helping solve London's housing crisis: "The housing crisis is the biggest challenge facing Londoners today and I have been honest from the start that we won’t be able to turn things round overnight. For decades, we have simply not built enough new and affordable homes in the capital, meaning that for too m...

IKEA designers are learning about compact storage from NASA's space architect

2017-06-21T19:55:00-04:00

Confined in Utah’s Mars Desert Research habitat for three days—habitat diameter: 33 feet—the five-person team experienced the cramped living quarters and zero-waste living necessary to survive a journey to outer space.

Designers from IKEA are exploring space-saving solutions for tiny homes by living in an actual Mars research station. During the immersion workshop led by Constance Adams, NASA architect behind the habitat for the first human mission to Mars, the team examines the ways in which astronauts' insight could be translated to innovative furniture solutions for dense urban environments.

“My dream outcome will be to solve the biggest problem on earth…storage,” said IKEA’s head of design, Marcus Engman. “How could you design storage in a completely new way?”

In Hong Kong, a housing shortage is leading people to live in 25 sq. ft. "space capsule pods"

2017-01-18T14:08:00-05:00

Hong Kong is a crowded city. According to census figures reported by Quartz, 57,100 households live in spaces between 75 and 140 sq ft. And, for the most part, the conditions of these tiny homes aren’t exactly great. Enter Sandy Wong, the inventor of a “space capsule pod”, a 25 sq. ft., ventilated, room rents for about $400-650 per month.

Space capsule-type dwellings aren’t exactly new. In Japan, for example, capsule hotels have been around for ages. These ones are pretty nice—they come replete with a computer, a TV, a bed, and a fire extinguisher. Residents share a kitchen and bathroom, which is already a norm in Hong Kong.

And, apparently, they’re a hit. Wong reports renting out the first ten capsules in a mere 15 days. Now he plans to build 1,000 more.

Charles Leadbeater on the meaning of home in today's culture of rootlessness

2016-12-09T15:20:00-05:00

The tiny house is just one example of the lengths to which people will go to create a sense of home even when they lack the means for it. It’s just one symptom of a much wider and intensifying search for belonging, which makes home as important to politics as the idea of class or rights – especially now, when so many people feel displaced, both literally and figuratively, by life in innovation-driven, high-tech, networked capitalism.

Man living in plywood "pod" in SF apartment told to knock it off by housing inspector

2016-04-14T13:00:00-04:00

[Berkowitz is now] offering custom pods for sale on Craigslist for people who want to make money with AirBnB or have their own subletters. [...] The Department of Building Inspection reached out ... confirming that the pods are illegal and a violation of housing, building, and fire safety codes. [...] "He would have to completely open it up or look at something different, such as a bed with a frame, with curtains, something that was open to the room." [...] "there are fire safety realities."

You may remember Peter Berkowitz's name from the not-an-April-Fools-Day post we made a couple weeks ago, reporting on the box freelance illustrator Berkowitz had constructed to live in his friends' apartment, at $400 a month. After the news took off, he had begun testing the waters in the rest of SF's bonkers housing market to construct more of these pods and sell them to others interested in curbing their rents. After hearing from the building inspector, he told Hoodline, "I was just trying to gauge interest from people nearby ... I am not moving forward with anything I outlined in that email."

Related SF-housing news:

Box sweet box: SF man lives in wooden "pod" in friends' apartment for $400/month

2016-04-01T12:36:00-04:00

With the median rent for a one-bedroom apartment at $3,670 a month, the city’s housing crisis has pushed frugal renters to the edge of their comfort limits. From tents to trucks, the next logical step in San Francisco has taken shape — in the form of a literal box. [...] “I really don’t feel like I’ve taken a hit in terms of my quality of life,” said Berkowitz, 25. “I don’t really notice I live in the pod anymore.”

More on the extreme lengths of SF housing:

Box sweet box: SF man lives in wooden "pod" in friends' apartment for $400/month

2016-04-01T12:36:00-04:00

More on the extreme lengths of SF housing:

Woman's dream tiny home clashes with Canadian law

2015-08-28T18:43:00-04:00

Cheryl Smith planned to move "off the grid" and into a small house near Clark's Harbour, N.S., a year ago. But thanks to Canadian building regulations, the four-by-six metre structure remains half-built and empty. [...] Canadian laws require living spaces to have access to power to run smoke detectors and air exchange systems. But Smith said the point of moving into her tiny home was to disconnect from the power grid.