Tag Archives: shipping container homes

This Airbnb Shipping Container Home in Texas has its own Rooftop Deck with a hot tub and hammock

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Located on a massive 27-acre patch of private land known as the Desert Rose Ranch, this shipping container Airbnb home finds itself right between Fredericksburg and Austin on the Texas Wine Trail. It comes with its own bedroom, bathroom, kitchenette, and perhaps my favorite part – a rooftop deck complete with patio furniture, a hot tub, and even a hammock! Designed and built by Bob’s Containers, it’s difficult to imagine that this idyllic holiday home was once a 40-foot x 8-foot shipping container.

Designer: Bob’s Containers

The container home follows Bob’s Containers’ “Porter Model”, which uses a standard 40-ft container and starts at $149,250. The transformation for this particular Airbnb saw the addition of a wide garage-style door on the front which lets in a sufficient amount of natural light as well as a fully decked home on the inside with all the bells and whistles. However, the home’s pièce de résistance is its terrace, accessible using a spiral staircase on the side. Make your way to the top and there’s patio furniture, a barbecue grill, a cowboy hot tub, and a hammock hanging off the side for the perfect unwinding experience. The cabin sits on a pretty large empty plot of land, giving you nothing but raw nature on all sides. There’s even a fireplace on the front yard that you can use on cold nights or just days that you’re craving s’mores for dinner.

The 40×8-foot terrace patio is probably the biggest highlight of the home’s experience. It gives you a place to watch sunrises and sunsets, or even unwind in that hot tub on winter evenings. A hammock cantilevers off the side, with space for 2 (although it’ll be a bit of a tight fit).

The patio comes equipped with Adirondak Chairs

Although it’s natural to wonder whether an 8-foot wide home is truly sufficient, this little ‘container in the woods’ is perfect for two people and maybe a child or pet too. On one end of the container is a bedroom that snugly fits a double bed with a large window on one side that gives you a view of the sprawling private property. Walk down the wood-floor hallway to the other side and there’s a mini kitchen for cooking, cleaning, and food prep (alternatively, a grill-top on the terrace lets you whip out burgers and steaks in a jiffy). There’s a bathroom beyond the kitchenette, and despite its size, it even manages to fit in a walk-in shower, just in case using the bathtub on the roof isn’t an option.

The Airbnb home is available for booking, and if you’re interested in building out your own shipping container home, you can head to the Bob’s Containers website to get a quote.

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This Container Cabin is made from stacked containers is nestled in a former paddy field

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Thailand is known for breathtaking palaces, enormous malls, glimmering beaches, and sumptuous cuisine. The tropical country also has friendly locals ready to give tourists their bigGES smiles. It’s not exactly popular for modern architecture, but there are plenty of excellent Thai architects and designers out there.

Architect Tung Jai Ork Baab used shipping containers to make this home in Thailand. Officially called the Container Cabin, the container house is under the OOST Campville project. The idea is for the cabin to be a home away from the city. Located in Nakhon Nayok, a small province in northeast Bangkok, the Container Cabin is meant to be rented for a staycation.

Designer: Tung Jai Ork Baab

The Container Cabin is situated within a former paddy field and has access to playgrounds and orchards. This holiday home shows an A-frame roof that shelters the living spaces that may be affected by high heat transfer. It also comes with steel plate louvres that allow wind flow and protect the house from sunlight and rain.

The main spaces are shipping containers that are already prefabricated. They can be easily assembled and delivered to most sites. There is the issue of flooding, but the architect’s solution was to create a small reservoir to act as a raised area for the cabin. There is a concrete base that is actually divided into two. At the center is a communal space where you can chill and hang out.

The design connects both the indoor and outdoor spaces. This cabin can be the perfect outdoor getaway destination for those who just want to relax and chill with nature. The living spaces are enough to make you have a grand time with family and friends.

Tung Jai Ork Baab’s holiday home features two stacked containers on one side where the bedrooms and living spaces are. On the other side, there is another bedroom that overlooks a pool that is surrounded by a deck. There are terraces and balconies around for more space for relaxation or nature-viewing. The walls are sliding doors and full-height windows.

The shipping container home’s interior is white for a clean and simple look. Old container doors have been transformed into shutters for additional privacy and shade. The outside of the containers is uncovered but painted gray, same with the A-frame roof structure.

The Container Cabin is just one of the many container homes we found interesting. We remember the Mansfield Container House and the Estúdio Lapinha in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. There’s also the MUA getaway cabin and the rest of architectural designs made of shipping containers that exhibit excellent waste repurposing and sustainable living. Expect more related designs of shipping container homes will be available.

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This tiny home composed of two shipping containers is designed for off-grid living

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The Mansfield Container House is an L-shaped tiny home composed of two disused shipping containers that merge together to form a tiny, off-grid cabin.

Shipping container homes have redefined modern architecture. Designers and architects across the globe have turned to disused shipping containers to convert into insulated, tiny homes. Cost-effective, eco-friendly, and modular by design, shipping containers provide the ideal template for designers and architects to have at it and let their creativity fly.

Designer: Robbie Walker

In the foothills of Australia’s Victorian Alps, Melbourne-based architect Robbie Walker merged two disused shipping containers together to form a tiny, off-grid cabin for family holidays and solo rendezvous.

Named Mansfield Container House after the town where it resides, Walker’s tiny home is comprised of two 20-foot shipping containers that amount to 30-square-feet in total. Coated with heavy-duty paint, Walker hoped to maintain the industrial personality of shipping containers on the outside. Inside, natural, polished plywood clads the interior walls to help brighten the exterior’s heavy-duty look.

Forming a right angle, the two shipping containers are connected by an external, hydraulics deck that folds down from one of the two shipping containers. Just in front of the fold-down deck, residents and guests can make use of the outdoor space with an expansive fireplace that can be used year-round.

Stationed behind the fold-down deck, the tiny home’s residents enjoy enough room for a living room, bathroom, and kitchen, which is equipped with a fold-out table as well as a fold-out guest bed.

In the other container, the main bedroom can be found, where a fold-down double bed and triple bunk are located with self-inflating mattresses. To save space and avoid unnecessary crowding between the two containers, a bathroom and kitchen sink can also be accessed in the bedroom container.

Stocked with all of the necessities for off-grid living, the Mansfield Container House has the means for solar power as well as water treatment systems. Solar panels were placed on the roof to generate and store solar power, while water bladders were built into the roof to preserve 1,000 liters of rainwater. Then, an integrated steel screen produces some shade for the sunny days the tiny home’s residents want to lounge out on the deck.

Since the cabin is off-grid, it does come with its own catalog of operational duties, as Walker explains, “It’s similar to the way a sailor must operate a yacht—you need to open a window to catch a breeze, and close down at the right time to avoid the bugs. But that’s part of the fun. It brings you closer to the elements and nature in this beautiful part of the world.”

The tiny home is a familiar sight on the farm, where several shipping containers plot the land. 

Inside, natural, polished plywood lines the walls for a warm contrast to the home’s industrial exterior.

The post This tiny home composed of two shipping containers is designed for off-grid living first appeared on Yanko Design.

This tiny home in Brazil coated in bright colors inside and out is formed from two disused shipping containers!

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Estúdio Lapinha in Belo Horizonte, Brazil is a tiny home constructed out of two conjoined shipping containers, designed by architecture studio Plano Livre.

The variations of tiny homes today seem to be endless. We’ve seen tiny houses with roofs that unfurl and expand to reveal concealed bedroom lofts. Then, there are the tiny home designs that can be assembled from flat-pack DIY kits. However, the most frequented choice for designers and architects of tiny homes has to be disused shipping containers.

By design, the corrugated steel boxes are prepared for every season and all the elements that come with them. In Belo Horizonte, Brazil, Plano Livre, a Minas Gerais-based architecture studio, designed and constructed Estúdio Lapinha, a tiny home formed out of two conjoined shipping containers.

Initially conceived for Casacor, an annual architectural show that takes place in Minas Gerais, the infrastructure and layout of Estúdio Lapinha were designed to be transported from Casacor’s exhibition space to a permanent residence. Finding transportability in shipping containers, the architects at Plano Livre merged two together to have one function as an infrastructural module and the other as the home’s living module.

The hydraulics of Estúdio Lapinha reside in the former module, while all of the home’s furniture and living spaces are located in the latter. By creating a dynamic tiny home out of modular shipping containers, Plano Livre constructed Estúdio Lapinha to be flexible and indeterminate in shape and size–a tiny home that can be expanded upon over time.

The tiny home’s exterior has been painted a muted lime green to complement the lush greenery that surrounds and completely immerses Estúdio Lapinha. Propped up on a wooden patio, Estúdio Lapinha finds height and rises alongside the trees and tall grasses nearby. Located on one side of Estúdio Lapinha, residents can lounge in a trampoline hammock just beyond the main bedroom’s expansive French doors.

Inside, bright painted walls and tiled flooring delineate each room and pay homage to Brazil’s colorful personality. The living and sleeping areas are the only parts of the home that find warmth in natural, unstained wooden paneling. The sofa’s back doubles as the bed’s headboard to provide a subtle and functional partition.

Throughout the home, steel shelving units provide extra storage space for bulkier items like heavy books and houseplants, tracing the ceiling from the kitchen to the cerulean blue bathroom. In addition to the expansive, floor-to-ceiling French doors, the home’s ceiling is painted the same green as its exterior to bring the home that much closer to the outdoors.

Designer: Plano Livre

Coated in cerulean blue, Estúdio Lapinha’s bathroom feels open and bright. 

Sliding floor-to-ceiling glass doors dissolve the barrier between the studio’s insides and the surrounding outdoors.

This shipping container has been transformed into a getaway by the sea!

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When designers repurpose shipping containers into shelters, it feels like the adult version of building forts and tents! It’s taking something that doesn’t resemble a shelter – like bedsheets or shipping containers – and turning them into the most wonderful getaways. This MUA getaway cabin is right by the Tbilisi Sea, in Georgia, and gives our summer imagination a life. The cabin is located 20 minutes away from the city center and has been designed by the architecture team to serve as a relaxing space where they can recharge their creative batteries – it’s like when a doctor prescribes medicine for themself, win-win!

With eco-insulation and solar power, this tiny home built from five shipping containers was designed for off-grid living!

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Ahurewa is a 60m2 off-grid tiny home constructed from five shipping containers to provide natural eco-insulation and the potential for modular expansion. Situated in the mountains of New Zealand’s Mahakirau Forest Estate, Ahurewa is a sustainable tiny home equipped with twelve solar panels, a 4kw system inverter, two 25,000 liter water tanks, and a worm-composting septic system.

Shipping containers are steadily proving to be much more multifunctional than we’re used to giving them credit. Initially passed off as just a means for delivery, we’ve seen the shipping container become a backyard swimming pool and now, the YouTube series ‘Living Big in a Tiny House,’ documents an off-grid home in the Mahakirau Forest Estate built from five 20-foot shipping containers.

After moving in with her husband, Rosie sold her home in Auckland to buy some land in the mountains where she could begin construction on her off-grid tiny home. Of the 600 hectares that make up the Mahakirau Forest Estate, Rosie’s tiny home, dubbed Ahurewa to honor the surrounding woodlands, takes up only nine of them. Each home site is covenanted with the QEII National Trust, trusting landowners to be guardians of the surrounding environment and protect it.

Composed of five shipping containers, Rosie’s tiny home benefits from natural eco-insulation and an industrial build that’s long-lasting and durable. Four of the five shipping containers are dedicated to actual living space, while the fifth shipping container only keeps the home’s mudroom. The mudroom primarily functions as a transitional space between the outdoors and indoors. Inside, Rosie houses the batteries, inverter, and power board for the solar panels that line the roof, keeping the hum of the inverter an appropriate distance away from the bedroom.

Since Rosie’s tiny home is entirely off-grid, sustainable utilities and add-ons fill the exterior and interior of each shipping container. Twelve solar panels line one shipping container’s roof, which is powered by a 4-kilowatt system inverter. Outside, two 25,000 liter water tanks and a worm-composting septic system provide water and an accompanying purification system for continued use and safe drinking.

Designer: Rosie x Living Big in a Tiny House

Unfinished plywood panels line the one bedroom of the house, highlighting the panoramic view of the surrounding environment, as seen through the double-glazed, floor-to-ceiling windows. 

Ahurewa’s bathroom features concrete panels and stained wood accents to complement the home’s industrial look.

The tiny home wraps around an exterior deck to provide 360° views of the mountains and forests that surround it.

One side of the house receives sunlight during the afternoon and evenings, while the other receives morning sunlight, so both sun and shade are within walking distance.

Architectural designs made of shipping containers that exhibit great waste repurposing + sustainable living!

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Recently, repurposed shipping containers have gained immense popularity in architecture! They are being used to build homes, offices, and other architectural structures. It’s a sustainable trend that gives birth to compact, modular, and easily portable structures that can serve as almost anything – from tiny homes to even ICU pods! This trend basically eliminates the process of construction, hence reducing greenhouse emissions, and contributing to designs that are not only ecological but economical as well. And, we’ve curated some of the best architectural structures for you, that have been created from shipping containers. Sustainable, compact, and surprisingly good-looking, these designs could be the future of modern architecture!

One of Handcrafted Movement’s projects that I absolutely loved was the Pacific Harbor model. Built from a shipping container, the details truly show the team’s wanderlust and craftsmanship. It is built on a 30’x8.5’ triple axel Iron Eagle trailer – compact, convenient, and classy. The interiors are kept light and breezy to manifest the feeling of spaciousness. The tiny home includes a downstairs flex area that can be turned into a bedroom or home office, a sleeping loft in the back, stainless steel appliances in the kitchen, and a Mini-Split System for air conditioning and heating. The exterior features Board & Batt, black-framed windows, cedar accents, a cedar post & deck system.

Containerwek transformed old shipping containers into 21 micro-apartments for people who visit the town of Wertheim, Germany. Deemed, My Home, all the apartments have been placed in decommissioned shipping containers. The containers have been clad in timber and organized in groups of three. The 26 square meter micro-apartments showcase an open-plan space, amped with a kitchenette, dining table, television, a bed, and a bathroom.

‘Bureau Agreste’ is a modern shipping container office that provides professionals with a dedicated working space. The contemporary aesthetic masks the fact that it is an eco-friendly space. It has two levels with an open floor plan that makes it feel roomier and encourages productivity. It also features solar panels on the roof along with a rainwater harvesting system which makes it perfect for off-grid locations – this way businesses can save on the high rent they would usually pay in big cities. The container suspension frees up the ground space for organizing recreational outdoor activities (or even parking!) and gives the elevation needed for natural light.

These ICU pods are called CURA (Connected Units for Respiratory Ailments) which means “cure” in Latin (doesn’t that make you feel a little better?) and these will help take some load off the hospitals, especially in Italy. Ratti’s Studio, Carlo Ratti Associati, and MIT’s Senseable City Lab are creating mobile field hospitals with these CURA Intensive Care pods that serve as a biocontainment unit for two patients at a time. The pods can be assembled and disassembled very quickly, and because it is a shipping container, they can be moved from epicenter to epicenter by road, rail, and ship, around the world to address the need for more ICUs. The units are designed in repurposed 6.1-meter-long (approximately 8 feet x 8.5 feet) shipping containers with a ventilation system that generates negative pressure inside – this prevents the contaminated air from escaping thus reducing the risk of infecting health professionals who are more vulnerable because of a shortage of protective gear.

 This two-story home crafted from shipping container materials and sapele wood is designed to rise and fall with the natural changes in sea level as we battle climate change. Kairu is a variation of the Japanese word for frog which is an homage to the water-based home. The area is still recovering from Hurricane Sandy even after a decade and could use innovative reconstruction. That is where Kairu House comes in as an affordable, sustainable, and resilient home. It will become the primary residence for the founder and principal architect of Rekstur and his family. The main building is made of two 40-feet-tall shipping containers.

Grillagh Water House by Patrick Bradley is made up of four stacked shipping containers! A balcony shaded by steel fins projects from the upper story of this house in Northern Ireland, which this architect and farmer built using four used shipping containers. “I didn’t want to change the idea or the aesthetics of the design but I had to come up with an alternative that was more affordable and that’s where the idea for shipping containers came from,” says Bradley.

Japanese architect Kengo Kuma has stacked 29 recycled shipping containers to make a Starbucks coffee shop alongside a shopping center in Hualien, Taiwan. The white containers have been put together to create a 320-square-meter cafe!

London architect James Whitaker depicts a proposal for a low-cost studio space in Germany comprising a cluster of shipping containers, which are arranged to allow direct sunlight into the interior at different times of the day.

 ‘Flowers in the Garden’ was designed to be a hybrid of communal workspace and a garden. The project challenges traditional office settings by integrating the natural environment as a part of the whole workspace. It is an organic but playful structure with soft screens and in-between green-buffering spaces that creates a diverse ecosystem of perforated mass that is always ‘breathing’. This office design lets you stay healthily distanced but not socially separated and provides a refreshing break from staring at your screens.

Cat Person provides ‘whole cat care,’ as they call it, which means they’ve considered everything, even giving the shipping containers a second purpose. The team at Cat Person knows that your cat will inevitably find its way to a cardboard box in the recycling corner, so they’ve made their shipping containers convertible into feline-friendly toys. Cat Person looked to industrial design to make further use of cardboard boxes and found transformation possible in corrugated cardboard and seams. Chris Granneberg, a California-based industrial designer, SLATE, a San Francisco-based strategic design studio, and Paul Davis, a UK-based illustrator, were all called on by Cat Person to seamlessly turn their cardboard shipping boxes into playhouses fit for felines.