This tiny home, from the 100 huts in 100 days project, is the perfect example of modern escapism!

Posted on 09/03/2021 by Shawn McNulty-Kowal

Since the onset of 2020’s global pandemic, those of us tired of being cooped up indoors have kept ourselves busy by searching through rabbit holes of cabin designs to find one of our dreams. Prefabricated cabins and tiny huts embrace the perfect escapist getaway, taking hold of globetrotters and homebodies alike. Incorporating their ideas into the mix, Tooke & Co., an architecture and design firm based in Manhattan Beach, continues to debut their collection of tiny huts, dubbed The Minimal Hut, through downloadable blueprints, which can be used when constructing your very own tiny hut.

With more than 50 cabin designs to peruse through and plenty more to come, interested buyers have plenty of options to find the tiny hut of their dreams. The Minimal Hut’s designs range from larger three-bedroom layouts to smaller studio spaces that can be used as saunas or even a game room or home gym. Sporting a triangular frame, Hut 053 is one of The Minimal Hut’s smaller cabin designs. Perfect angles, straight facades, and a steep apex constitute the tiny hut’s right triangular frame, allowing for a steep, pitched roof that offers high ceilings and expansive windows. On one facade, Hut 053 diffuses the boundary between the outdoors and the hut’s interior with a large, glass-pane window that stretches to each corner. Then, a slimmer, rectangular window built into the hut’s frame is placed just above ground-level on another facade.

As currently designed, Hut 053’s blueprint calls for a one-bedroom, studio layout, which includes a small kitchenette and living space with options for a wood or gas stove, floor heating, and Mini-Split for additional heating and cooling. Outside, Hut 053 comes equipped with a 256-sq deck and prospective residents can enjoy the hut’s outdoor shower. Hut 053’s geometric frame also allows for some adaptability when it comes to placing the tiny hut outdoors – with such a pointed angle, it can wiggle into any corner of the globe.

Designer: The Minimal Hut x Tooke & Co.

Hut 053’s triangular geometric build makes room for a high ceiling and wide window that stretches the entirety of one facade.

With a steep, pitched roof, Hut 053 feels a lot bigger than it looks.

Sharp angles and apexes allow Hut 053 to be placed virtually anywhere.

An outdoor shower and smaller, rectangular window comprises another facade of Hut 053.

The side views of Hut 053 reveal space for an outdoor deck and shower area.

Aerial view of Hut 053.

This sustainable cabin glows like a candle & was built using cross-laminated timber!

Posted on 05/01/2021 by Ruchi Thukral

It is my first day back at work after a long weekend that I spent cabin hunting to alleviate my urge to travel. I found this sustainable wooden one called Kynttilä by Ortraum Architects which is Finnish for ‘candle’ – makes sense because it instantly gave me the warm cozy cabin vibes! Kynttilä’s linear shape with its triangular roof is pretty much like a geometric candle adaption in itself.

The cabin is built on Lake Saimaa and is right on the border of lush woods and endless serene water. The prefabricated cabin only takes one day to be assembled. Helsinki-based architecture firm constructed Kynttilä from cross-laminated timber (CLT) with the exteriors featuring larch board cladding. CLT is a wonderfully eco-friendly construction material that offers high strength and structural simplicity for cost-effective buildings. It has a much lighter environmental footprint than concrete or steel. CLT is also quicker to install, reduces construction waste on-site, improves thermal performance, with light handling duties making it better for health and safety, and is versatile enough to be molded according to different designs.

Kynttilä has a 15-square-meter floor space which is optimized for a short stay. It includes built-in furniture like the bed that is fitted on one glazed end and a ladder that leads up to a bunk bed above the door. The sweeping glass windows add openness to the small space and give a cooling visual contrast to the otherwise warm wooden aesthetic. Eaves overhang at both ends of the cabin to provide a sheltered, raised platform for sitting on or storage while also protecting the woodpile kept beneath.

“The space is strongly linked to nature, as the large window creates direct and intimate contact and communication with the surroundings. In the night time, like a candle, Kynttilä shines as a warm light on the lakeshore,” said Ortraum Architects. When you turn on the lamp at dusk, the cabin truly does glow like a candle in the untouched forest and that is why the team planned the most low-impact construction process they could to preserve the stillness of the environment. It is exactly the kind of off-the-grid spot we could all use to recuperate from 2020.

Designer: Ortraum Architects

This “unfolding house” comes prefabricated and can be assembled in less than 3 hours!

Posted on 03/12/2020 by Sarang Sheth

Putting an absolutely new kind of spin on “Home Delivery”, Brette Haus’ prefabricated cabins are literally shipped to your location on the back of a trailer. In a matter of 3 hours, the home is placed on the site, unfolded, and secured in place, turning it from one weird wooden carton into a liveable cabin with anywhere between 22 to 47 sq.ft. of space (depending on the cabin’s variant).

Each cabin takes roughly 8 weeks to fabricate and comes made entirely from carbon-neutral, weather-proof, and sustainable cross-laminated timber. There is no need for a permanent foundation… the cabins can easily be unfolded on any levelled ground before being secured in place using screw piles. The hinges on the cabin can survive up to 100 folding cycles (which means you can carry your house to multiple locations), and Brette Haus even offers optional addons like a waste-tank and solar panel kit, allowing you to live comfortably, yet off the grid… and possibly far away from civilization if you’re tired of the human race after this exhausting year.

Designer: Brette Haus

Work from home making you claustrophobic? Now you can work outside all year long!

Posted on 30/09/2020 by Ruchi Thukral

Have you shushed your sibling during a call or gave your partner a death stare when they walk in the middle of your Zoom conference? If I had a dollar for every time I did that, I would be able to buy multiple of these home office pods! Assemble it in your backyard in just a day, we all know we need a home improvement project as an outlet because banana bread can’t hold the fort any longer.

If you share your apartment or just generally have a small urban home, you must have made a lot of makeshift arrangements for a professional background but is it really helping you focus when you are living at work? Let’s revise to what it is – working from home, rather from your private backyard office because you are a boss for keeping it together in 2020. This pod is called ‘My Room in the Garden’ because that is exactly what it is and we don’t want to leave any space for confusion as we are all trying to minimize our per-my-last-emails. The pod’s external structure is crafted from weatherproof aluminum and the interior has been designed using birch. To alleviate that claustrophobic feeling there are floor-to-ceiling windows that let plenty of natural light flood in. As previously mentioned, you are the boss and therefore this pod is fully customizable to fit in your existing space. Since it is a modular prefabricated system, you can build your pod in a way that it optimizes your backyard or your driveaway without having to move anything around. The smallest unit is around 6 feet by 8 feet, and costs $6,400; the largest starts at $13,600 and you can expand it with as many modules as you want.

“All components are pre-assembled flat-pack design, which is digitally fabricated and geometrically efficient to minimize material waste. Features like peg walls are great at organizing the internal space allowing for flexible configurations of shelves, storage, desks. You finally have the space you always wanted, a spare room just outside your home where you can concentrate, work or relax,” says the team.

Designer: My Room in the Garden

Click Here to Buy Now!

This panoramic view cabin keeps bugs out using a unique Japanese technique

Posted on 26/05/2020 by Ruchi Thukral

I am obsessing over outdoor cabins since we are all stuck indoors. My favorites are the ones like LUMIPOD because they bring the vastness of nature into your cabin through the thoughtfully designed structure and, in this case, creative windows! We all know windows are a true blessing in quarantine and LUMIPOD seems to have the one so large its basically a door into the wild.

The LUMIPOD are a series of prefabricated cabins that are installed 1000m above sea level in the French Alps (here is when you start planning your post-pandemic getaway) so you can only imagine how pristine the views are. To do the French Alps justice, the design team built the structure with one aim – giving you a fully immersive experience of being in nature with a luxurious upgrade. The most unique feature about this cabin is its LUMICENE windows – the curved window provides a 180º view and makes you feel like you are in a snow globe. The window is set in aluminum frames sliding between two rails so you can blend the indoors and outdoors by simply opening the window.

The circular cabin measures 5.45 m with interiors specifically designed to resemble a high-end hotel. The structure is made from steel to provide top grade stability that is required by the LUMICINE windows. Another interesting feature about this house is how it keeps the insects away – the exterior has been wrapped in Douglas fir which has been charred using a Japanese technique (shou-sugi-ban) proven to keep bugs outside your bedroom! The interiors have earthy tones because of the light oak and merino wool usage which provide a warm ambience while also keeping the cabin literally warm through their insulation properties.

It is a minimal cabin that allows you to focus on the scenic experience rather than being distracted by free toiletries. “This prefabricated housing module, a real cocoon of simplicity, settles in the middle of Nature to welcome city dwellers willing to relax away from the concrete jungle,” says the LUMIPOD team. The cabin has three different sizes to accommodate your needs and can be installed in 2-3 days. It feels like a personal snow globe and I will continue to imagine all the little details about it until the next cabin getaway.

Designer: LUMIPOD

A million dollar flexible living solution hides in this sustainable cabin

Posted on 13/04/2020 by Ruchi Thukral

I can’t be the only one who thinks about where would I like to be quarantined next if the situation does arise again – like what kind of house, what view would I like to have and should I go solo or pick my quaran-team. Very valid questions given the times we live in and I am finding the answers to them in my favorite Pinterest pass time – tiny modular homes like Cabin One.

Cabin One is described as a passionately designed home for the future and its minimalist look certainly appeals to millennials who will now be able to buy homes given that the lockdown is making them spend less on avocados (you know what I am talking about). What I love about Cabin One is that it promotes flexible micro-living through its modular build. You can customize the 25 square meters of space as per your needs – it could be a beautiful cabin for one, holiday home for two or a quirky office space that stands in between an Airbnb and WeWork (given that the future is all about working remotely, did I just come up with the next million-dollar startup?). “We have reduced the complexity of the construction industry to three important elements: comfort, quality, and user experience. We do not think in square meters, we think in features,” says Simon, Cabin One’s designer.

It is lined entirely in wood with cozy interiors that will make staying at home feel like a retreat. The modern wooden abode is created from renewable raw materials, produced off-site, and delivered in full to its final destination for easy installation. The large windows allow a lot of natural ventilation and sunshine to grace the cabin and bring the feeling of spaciousness to the otherwise compact quarters. It just feels like a safe space and that is all you need to hang on to during complex times and may you find it within you instead of in a house. In the meantime, take an interactive virtual property tour – soon all real estate might work like this!

Designer: Simon Becker of Cabin Spacey

A zen minimalist cabin that brings nature in and takes distractions out

Posted on 28/02/2020 by Ruchi Thukral

We all know the movie Birdbox and we associate it with a stressful situation, I mean it was definitely didn’t fit in the comedy genre, right? However, I came across a different Birdbox by Livit, a Norwegian company, to counteract those feelings and really soothe our souls. This Birdbox is actually a prefabricated shipping container-like cabin that offers one-of-a-kind escapes to lush destinations surrounded by nature.

The cabins are simple, rectangular structures with huge circular and oval windows to give you a larger than life view of nature. Just like the exterior, the interior also has minimal decor which makes for a cozy space with a queen bed and a handful of chairs. The Birdboxes come in two sizes currently – the “Mini” at 10.5’ x 7.2’ x 7.2’ “Mini” and the “Medi” at 16.7’ x 7.87’ x 7.87’.” There’s also a separate “Birdbox Bathroom” which features a black tint one-way glass floor-to-ceiling window.

These box cabins are designed to be dropped in places with a minimal footprint that bring you closer to nature while providing comfort and shelter. They can be perched on mountain tops too because Birdbox cabins are made to withstand extreme winds and arctic conditions. There is also an option of having preinstalled solar panels in the cabins. Livit is currently selling three cabins and has two of its structures available for rent in its native Norway, one of them is on Airbnb – now you know where your next vacation will be!

Designer: Livit

This prefab cabin is what dreams are made of

Posted on 08/08/2018 by Sarang Sheth

mono_cabin_1

Measuring at 9 feet wide, 12 feet high, and 16 feet across, the Mono Cabin is literally homely. I mean literally. Shaped like the icon for a home, this pre-fab cabin comes ready to live in, and can be carried and placed literally anywhere your heart desires.

Available in three styles, the Mono comes with an extruded profile and an option of having glass panels on the front and back (after all, it’s the view that adds to the beauty of the cabin), as well as incorporate a glass skylight. The 9ft.x12ft. floor space is ideal for a bed, sofa, and even a small work-table, and there’s even a 4-foot long deck at the entrance, for your early-morning coffee-drinking sunset-watching needs. The cabin comes with 6 pot lights and a plug-point, solid core insulation, and even electric heating, making life easy while you literally retire to the beauty of the nature around you.

Designer: Drop Structures

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