It's another work week - here's a tiny house documentary

Since my work has taken over most of my time this week I'm presenting this video from Kirsten Dirksen to keep the appetites whetted and imaginations flowing.

Her documentary is called, "We the Tiny House People"

TV producer and Internet-video personality Kirsten Dirksen invites us on her journey into the tiny homes of people searching for simplicity, self-sufficiency, minimalism and happiness by creating shelter in caves, converted garages, trailers, tool sheds, river boats and former pigeon coops.

So without further diatribes - 

Trailer Destruction - The Vardo begins

Trailer Destruction - the beginning

The humble start to the creation of a trailer based Vardo - 

a.k.a. what am I getting myself into right after the first freeze of the year...

I've had for several years a 4.5'x8' convertible utility trailer that tilts and extends out to 4.5'x12' sitting there in my yard getting very bored.  It's served a useful life from hauling landscaping materials, lumber, two large oak church pews from New Jersey to New Hampshire, two marble topped cabinets from my parental units, even several motorcycles from time to time.  Lately it's just been just collecting branches and other yard waste as I clean up overgrowth and broken limbs and such.  

Since this year I had decided to follow my interest in small/tiny houses, the concept and previous plans for creating a Vardo finally came back to the forefront of my mind.  I figure it was a good start to get my feet wet with tiny homes.  I've own a not so tiny 1897 Victorian that I currently live in situated in the middle of the largest city in New Hampshire.  My lot is 50' x 100' and contains my home, two car garage and two car parking pad.  

So after researching many different options for Vardo designs I settled on P.A.D.'s Don Vardo plan available here - Don Vardo plans 

The reason I chose that one in particular was the construction techniques used.  It's designed in a lot of ways how one would actually build a well insulated home that includes electrical and heat. I also love the engineered beams used for the roof support. I'm not going to follow the plans completely but will modify my trailer, the structure and look to fit into my ideal in my head.  The end result will be a trailered Vardo that is single axle, under the 8.5' width limit according to US DOT rules, and about 10' in length.  As a result of extending the width of my existing trailer I will be beefing up the actual frame as well as upgrading the axle to a 3500 lb wider axle.  I've started the research on trailer axle kits and frame options and will talk about that in a later post.

So, as I move forward I will attempt to document the process as much as I can in photographs, drawings, sketches and anything else I can produce.  As a short background on me - I've done everything from basic framing, electrical, plumbing, heating, roofing, tiling, painting, welding... and so on. I don't feel that anything will be out of my realm of skills to complete safely or within a reasonable time.  I've not set a time limit for completion of the project since I've got enough on my plate with current home maintenance and my work at my actual job.  

At the start of next month I'm attending Deek's Tiny House Building workshop where I plan on finding more ideas and get to discuss a lot of things before really diving in to my project.  Info on the workshop is here -  Tiny House Building Workshop #3.  In the meantime - here's a few pics of my trailer as I broke it down to its core components.  

Trailer after I cleaned out the brush and yard waste

The gate on the back is the same as the front. Both of the gates dropped down as shown with the tongue extended to make the full 12' length

Tongue extended to 12' length - minus gate

Decking will be removed and sides

Plywood decking gone

Starting to get a better idea of frame design

Removing the sides

sides gone

view from tongue end

bottom view of frame

As she sits now waiting for rebirth - faster, stronger, bigger!

Dreaming and planning of Vardos

Dreaming of Vardos

Here's just an idea of how much can be done in the small spaces of a vardo design.  The camerawork on the video is a bit bouncy but we're interested in details and use of the space.

I've started tearing apart my existing tilt trailer and have drawn up plans for beefing up the axle and frame. This will include extending out from the original 4.5' bed width to at least 7' and from the 12' down to 10' in length.  The goal is to end up with a well insulated and functional small space.  My next post will include photos of the trailer as it was being torn down to bare frame.  If you have any inspirational videos or images for Vardo designs please post them in the comments section.  We're here to share and inspire!

World Homeless Day 10/10/2012

Tomorrow is a day that is about the homeless situation across the world. Your house may be ridiculously large or it may be way too small, but remember at least you have one. Shelter of any kind is often times a welcome change.

 The purpose of World Homeless Day is to draw attention to homeless people’s needs locally and provide opportunities for the community to get involved in responding to homelessness, while taking advantage of the stage an ‘international day’ provides.


Please pass along the link to anyone you know that would care to get involved. Awareness of the issues is the first step in fixing problems. Thank you!

Welcome to Drewminutive

Welcome to Drewminutive:

Starting out on journey to Tiny dwellings and adventure

I'm starting on a journey of discovery, planning and execution of smaller and more reasonable dwellings also known as tiny homes.  I'm glad you stopped by and hope you will follow me through my adventures and possibly learn a thing or two along the way.  We all have so much to learn from each other in the small home community. It's a return to things that make sense and have a greater efficiency.  It's time to stop letting our objects and dwellings own us and take back our lives.

My name is Drew and I assume that part was obvious.  The minutive is derived from diminutive.

di·min·u·tive

  [dih-min-yuh-tiv]

adjective

1.

small; little; tiny: a diminutive building for a model-train layout.

2.

Grammar . pertaining to or productive of a form denotingsmallness, familiarity, affection, or triviality, as the suffix -let,  in droplet  from drop.