Minarc’s Plus Hus is a tiny energy-efficient prefab marketed towards homeowners seeking to add an accessory dwelling unit to their property. The 320-square-foot structure is prefabricated in downtown Los Angeles, and it can be shipped flatpack to anywhere in the U.S. with prices starting at $37,000.
Liberation Tiny Home’s 24' x 8.5' entry-level home is called Rumspringa, and it starts at $45,000. The home is available with either a modern or traditional design aesthetic. From there, the models size up and can include optional features like soaking tubs, composting or incinerating toilets, and stairs with built-in storage.
The swanky mid-pool conversation pit was added by new owners during the renovation of a 1970s Brutalist villa in Sardinia, Italy.
The architects incorporated sustainably sourced parota wood into the living room’s sunken seating area. The Turn Tall side table is from Blu Dot, and the pillows are from West Elm.
This Cupertino home features a conversation pit outfitted with a 250-square-foot configuration of Patricia Urquiola’s Tufty-Time sofa for B&B Italia. Overhead, flush-mounted LED strips demarcate the lounge area.
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Cupertino, California
Dwell Magazine : September / October 2017
The Miller House and Garden features a custom-made sofa in the open-plan living area designed by Saarinen with textiles by Girard. The home was widely published and is in part credited for the popularity of conversation pits in the 1950s and 1960s.
In Texas, where everything is bigger, Ryan McLaughlin is placing his bets on something small. Specifically, a simple 160-square-foot cabin that he hopes city-dwellers will book to get away, find some focus, and reconnect with nature. The result is a laidback, pitched-roof cabin in which every inch of space is thoughtfully allotted so that guests can spend the maximum amount of time outdoors.
Two San Francisco art and travel addicts overhauled a loft—and customized a pair of shipping containers—to accommodate their collection and reflect their passions. The shipping containers were stacked, joined with steel tubes, and lashed to reinforced floor joints to make them earthquake-safe.
Project Name: Containerlove Shipping Container Home in Germany
Located on New Zealand’s North Island along the Coromandel Peninsula, this timber-clad shipping container house by Crosson Clarke Carnachan Architects captures the simplicity of living with nature. An open-plan layout extends the interior toward the surrounding landscape and ocean, while a built-in mechanism reveals a drop-down deck on one side of the unique holiday home.
Transforming shipping containers into habitable spaces is a growingly popular subset of prefab. Just off the Delaware River in Pennsylvania, Martha Moseley and Bill Mathesius adapted an unused concrete foundation to create a home made from 11 stacked shipping containers. "We were inspired by the site, and our desire to have something cool and different," says Moseley.
Mike McConkey, a superintendent for a general contractor, tasked Chris Bittner of OBR Architecture with designing an environmentally sensitive home for he and his wife in San Diego County. Utilizing three shipping containers and a bevy of cost-effective appliances, they managed to limit the budget to $160,000.
Peruvian-born designer Sachi Fujimori's Casa Reciclada, or Recycled House, was constructed from a used shipping container. Architects Anna Duelo, Úrsula Ludowieg OPhelan and Marc Koenig also collaborated on the project.
A small shipping container home in New Plymouth, New Zealand, features a retractable porch.