Clever Stairs
Ryan at The Tiny Life has found some clever small space stair designs that double as storage. I’m not sure how viable any of these designs are but they sure spark the imagination.
Weekly Online Tiny House Show
Ryan Mitchell, at The Tiny Life, has started hosting a weekly online show. The most recent show’s topic was on Design Tools for Small Spaces. Past shows are recorded and also available online. I really like this innovate approach to bringing tiny house content online and look forward to seeing Ryan’s show grow.
Furniture for Tiny Spaces
Ryan, over at The Tiny Life, posted an article on some cool convertible furniture ideas for small spaces. Furniture that transforms into other useful forms can extend the functional use of any space. I like finding products like this because it gives the woodworker in me some inspirational ideas for future projects.
Tiny Hotel in Germany
Here’s an interesting idea for some simple lodging. It’s a tiny room for rent in Germany that’s not much bigger than a bed. For the frugal traveler this might be just the right fit.
Land Sharing
One very appealing solution for making a simple homestead a reality is land sharing. I’ve met a few people who have done this in the past and it requires a different way of looking at property ownership. In one case the residents divided up the asset (land) into shares and had verbal agreements on boundaries instead of physical or legal property lines. When a member wanted to move they would have to sell their shares to another resident or an outsider approved by the community.
While this kind of arrangement has it’s potential disadvantages it has many benefits too. For example a community garden or larger flock of chickens would be easier to manage for a small community than a single family. Sharing the costs of an alternative energy system, water system, property taxes, and general maintenance would also lighten the load on each individual family or individual.
I’ve been thinking I’d like our next move to be to a property big enough for a few family and even friends. Finding the right larger community would be tricky because zoning rules don’t normally allow for such developments. Most planning departments think in terms of dividing land into lots and single family zoning. Finding a community and piece of land that is already zoned multi-family is preferable. Better yet would be a community that already understands how land sharing works and is open to newcomers.
I’m not the only one thinking this way; also read these recent articles on RowdyKittens and The Tiny Life. Photo credit to RowdyKittens.
The Tiny Life
Ryan Mitchell is a very active member of the tiny house movement and regular participant on Tiny House Forum. He lives in Charlotte, NC and hopes to build his tiny house within a year and he plans to live there while pursuing his Doctorate in Industrial Organizational Psychology.
Ryan also just launched a tiny house blog and forum in addition to setting up this very novel map that allows everyone in the greater simple living community to add themselves. It’s a three step process and really easy to do. It would be amazing to see this map filled out with simple living advocates from all around the globe. Please add yourself to the map.
Be sure to provide only the information you want to appear publicly online. For example I’m comfortable with my full name being out there, but many people are not. If you’re not comfortable with your street address being published online leave that out and only post the city or state. Here are links to Ryan’s new websites.
