Cabins for Haiti
This is a prototype of a flat pack cabin being built for deployment to Haiti. The plan is to setup a factory near Port-au-Prince and donate 1,000 of these homes to Haiti.
Earthbag & Pallet Emergency Shelter
Dr. Owen Geiger, the Director of the Geiger Research Institute of Sustainable Building, posted one of my design concepts on his Earthbag Building Blog. I had whipped this design up for a 1 Hour Design Challenge at Core77, in exactly 1-hour using Google SketchUp. Thanks for all the earthbag inspiration Owen!
Homeless Shelter in a box
I really love the ingenuity of this simple rolling homeless shelter designed by Paul Elkins. Paul has an amazing mind for coming up with incredible solutions for tiny mobile spaces and I highly recommend that you spend some time exploring his blog after checking out this latest homeless shelter concept.
Ed’s Shed
A fellow named Ed built this tiny house for $50 to use as a place to sleep while attending a 4-day music festival. He hauled it there in the back of his truck.
While Ed’s shed is a bit on the funky side I can see how something like this with just a little more time and effort could be a much safer place for someone to sleep and a big step up from a tent.
Arctic Shed
2-B-2 Architecture has a shelter solution for those working in the extreme conditions of the Arctic. This until will support three people and is moved from site to site.
Simple Panelized Shelter
Some recent news about the Sacramento Police rousting a group of homeless folks from their temporary tent town got me a bit riled up last week. Being someone who likes to take proactive measures when trouble brews I set to work on publishing a simple panelized structure that could be built as temporary housing for all sorts of needs including homelessness.
In addition to working on the house for Khayelitsha I’m working to revise the plans of this smaller shelter so that the walls, floor and roof will also be made up of individual 4′ by 8′ panels. This size is ideal for transporting in a pickup truck with the main draw back being that it uses a bit more lumber to construct. Keep you eye on Tiny House Design this week for the revised plan.
A Bold Solution for the Homeless
The Mad Housers are an Atlanta based non-profit organization dedicated to showing people how to put a roof over their own heads. The end result are temporary tiny houses build with and by the folks that will live there until they get on their feet.
Shelter, Shacks and Shanties
Steve from Murchison, New Zealand send me a link to a book written and illustrated in 1914 by Daniel C Beard. Beard was also one of the founders of the Boy Scouts of America. The book is called Shelter, Shacks and Shanties and focuses on simple shelters that can be built with simple tools. You can read it online at Project Gutenberg. Thanks for sending this my way Steve!
Low-Cost Earthbag Buildings
If you have a subscription to Mother Earth News you probably spotted this cute earthbag building. While it’s small footprint (8-foot diameter) is probably too small to be a tiny house for most people it is an excellent example of how easy an earthbag home could be built. There are lots of books and plans for earthbag homes available but you can find a lot of information on the internet about building with earthbags online.
The Paper House
I’m pretty sure the big bad wolf would love to come across a piggy living in this paper house; but at a cost of only $5,000 I bet that piggy could build anther pretty easily. This is a 400 squre foot house that is made from recycled cardboard and weights a total of 1,700 pounds. It was created by Gerd Niemoeller. Read more about the Paper House.
