Architects construct houses according to the needs and wishes of their clients. The structural shape, the window arches, and the door frame all come into question. Sometimes that client is a cat . The designers with Build Tiny recently built and completed a tiny house in October of 2020 called Cyril House, which was warmly named after the (human) client’s grandfather who loved tiny houses. The tiny house has all the perks we’ve come to expect and enjoy inside the walls of tiny homes, but Cyril House was also built for cats.
Coming in at 8 x 2.7 m, with a steel frame and aluminum exterior, the Cyril House is a double-decker one-bedroom with a full-size kitchen, lounge area, bathroom, and home office. Resting on a double-axle trailer, this tiny home comes with a high ceiling that opens up the tiny home even further for you and your feline friend. Mounted between the office and the loft bedroom, carpeted shelves stagger between one another for your cat to traverse while you study or get work done in the home office upstairs. Across the way, you’ll find the main queen-sized bedroom with plenty of storage space and even a hollowed-out rectangular space so that you can get ready for your day without hitting your head against the ceiling. Moving down the ladder to the living area of the tiny house, the full-sized kitchen is outfitted with a built-in gas heater, dishwasher, four-burner gas stovetop, oven, full-sized refrigerator, and plenty of storage space and pantries.
Then, continuing through a cavity sliding door, into the bathroom, you’ll find plenty of floor space for your cat’s litterbox as the designers at Build Tiny designed the bathroom to optimize its overall space, so that homeowners can enjoy spacious showers and plenty of room for hygienic routines. Residents can also dry off comfortably inside the shower even on the coldest of mornings thanks to the heat-retention capabilities of the integrated shower dome. The designers also installed a Natureshead composting toilet inside the bathroom to enhance the tiny house’s overall commitment to sustainability. Just outside the bathroom, Build Tiny integrated a solar storage cupboard into one of the home’s side facades, so that excess solar energy can be stored with you instead of sending it back to the grid. In addition to the energy-efficient, integrated solar energy panels, there are plans for a future fireplace to heat the home from the living room’s corner and a gas califont provides hot water for the tiny home. You and your cat will feel right at home inside of this very big, tiny home.
Designer: Build Tiny
This tiny house is constructed entirely from 100% recyclable materials to reduce landfill waste!
As I am writing this, it is almost December and I am already turning up the volume on ‘I am dreaming of a white Christmas!” while looking at this sustainable Scandinavian grill house blanketed in snow! FLEXSE is a prefabricated micro-dwelling solution aka tiny house designed to adapt to ALL seasons, so even if winter wonderland is not your thing, this cabin will certainly be.
The cozy modern structure is constructed entirely from 100% recyclable materials and can be assembled in parts on-site or positioned on foundations, allowing it to be set up in remote areas, the countryside, or even on water. Since the construction industry is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than aviation (12% vs 2% – can you believe it?), it is wonderful to see an all-season eco-friendly house . The first prototype was a small BBQ shack intended for cooking and then the team made sure it could be tailored for different purposes too – like a sauna, a guest house, a home office, and more. This eventually led to FLEXE being a complete tiny house. One of its most distinct details is the circular window which almost makes the house look like it has the most elegant monocle with a periscope-like view.
The angled roof minimises the accumulation of snow and rain while giving it a visual aesthetic that will remind you of the houses we drew as children with chimneys. It features an elegant wood-stripped interior and exterior with an open grill that warms the space. The ellipse-shaped cabin is so compact and yet maximizes the usable area by maintaining a minimal footprint and using design to make it functional for different scenarios. FLEXSE can setup on different foundations – concrete slabs, metal piers, and more, allowing it to be an accessible tiny home for remote areas, even on water! I imagine FLEXSE to be most popular as a getaway cabin or a remote office pod.
“We are looking at material reuse as one of the areas to further reduce the city’s carbon footprint. It shouldn’t be a tail-pipe problem of how to manage landfills but a design problem of how to make our structure a material bank where the material doesn’t only retain value but also you can sell them in the future giving it a longer, more purposeful life while reducing waste” says Eden Brukman, Architect and Senior Green Building Coordinator for the City of San Francisco on their efforts to find climate-friendly architectural solutions. Sustainable architecture is booming as we explore green building solutions and the goal is for them to be scalable so there is a large impact.
Designer: SA Lab
This transformative furniture lets you lounge on your desk during WFH
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I am a huge foodie, and I have noticed this in both cuisine and design that the French love taking what you know, flipping it on its head, and giving you a crazier yet better version while you just sit there wondering “How do they do this every time?!”. The latest product to fall in this category is the ‘Chaise Renversée’ – a desk that can also transform into a long chair by the famous French architect Pierre-Louis Gerlier. The literal translation of Chaise Renversée is ‘chair overturned’, I love how simply the French put everything.
Since we are all cooped up in our homes, we are constantly finding ways to optimize space. Especially if you live in a city, you are likely to have everyday objects that are modular so that you have a functional space. Our current situation and the need to be flexible within a small space is exactly what inspired Gerlier to design the Chaise Renversée. It is the perfect blend of work from home and Netflix from home into one piece of modern furniture, it provides a stable table area to work and can then transform into the ‘Chaise Lounge’ when you want to relax.
“Chaise renversée is a desk for those who do not wish to have a desk,” says the architect, and I think that makes sense! If you only use your desk to reply to emails or pay the bills then it is inefficient to have a rigid, barely-used piece of furniture occupying space in your home. What we need is for our flexible lifestyle is what Gerlier gives us, a lounge chair that also works for work – if our 2020 mood could be translated into furniture, this is it. Sleeping on your desk has a whole new meaning.
Designer: Pierre-Louis Gerlier
