Oh, Ross...Karina, Karina!*

As a follow-up to my last post, here's an example of a home I could move into immediately!** This is an example of a Ross Chapin Architects small home design, the Karina, designed by Karen DeLucas, former owner of the house shown. Please check out that last link, that blog will take you through the house timeline of construction, from insulation, interior/exterior paint colors, vendors used for lights and fixtures, flooring, and landscaping through text and loads of great photographs.

Yes, you do see stainless appliances and granite countertops in this kitchen. However, I feel the kitchen's small scale and practicality stand for more than those so-called HGTV "must-haves."

I love the wood tones and crisp calming colors of the interior design and truly adore the exterior house details.

Click to enlarge

The Karina home plan comes in at 1,606 square feet and is part of their collection of small homes over 1,000 sq ft. It's entire foot print is only 22' X 55'; however, the smallest of the three bedrooms is a healthy 11'-6" x 12', it still has 2 full and one 3/4 sized bathrooms and even a separate 2nd floor laundry room with space-saving pocket doors.


Brilliant, right?!



Now, the bath is a bit more swank than I would prefer with its attached-yet-separate tub and the glassed-in shower with "rain" head, but I wouldn't turn my nose up at the soft-close, low-flush toilets.

Lovely wrap-around back porch


* Loose adaptation of "Corinna, Corinna".
** IF I had the money and/or a job where I could afford the upkeep! ;)

Could I Stuff My Stuff in a Little House?

Loring from Tumbleweed Houses

Sometimes I think I could conquer this clutter problem if I only had a smaller home.

You know, if I was FORCED to get rid of a lot of stuff. Because, volunteering to let some things go is NOT my strong suit. Even though I don't buy much at all, there is so much stuff stored for the future. I guess getting rid of it is hard because it might mean I don't expect to someday use the heart-shaped cake pan or pancake molds (for someone other than me or friends), five flower vases, a Shaft-like leather coat (I feel so dressy in it), the BCBG satin cocktail dress (ditto), or the large traveler's backpack from my 2002 trip to Ireland.

I would love to fit everything I own in something like this little house, but even if I get rid of all the aspirational things, I would still need my magazines, my photo albums (pre-digital), and my animated character figurines. Above all, I would also need storage for my fabric, patterns, supplies, and sewing machine. So I don't think I'll ever fit into this little gem...

251 Square Feet*

But a girl can continue to dream, can't she?

Of course, their much larger homes (680-840 sq. ft. ) are adorable too, like the Enesti, Sebastarosa, and the truly cool-sounding (and almost identical to the Loring) B-53!

* The loft is not officially included in the listed 251 square feet. With it, the house is actually over 400 square feet.

P.S. Explore their site, there is so much information there. The comments on every house design page are fascinating; especially when it comes to the customization requests.

Pick A Pocket Neighborhood

Erin Cottage

A year ago, I wrote a post mentioning Ross Chapin Architects and their designs for small homes used in planned "pocket neighborhoods." These neighborhoods were the idea of architect Ross Chapin and Jim Soules, founder of The Cottage Company*. Jim's definition of a pocket neighborhood is "a group of homes that face and relate to one another around a landscaped common area..."

This month, the April issue of Cottage Living magazine features them, their designs, and the history of their first project together, the Third Street Cottages neighborhood in Puget Sound, Seattle created in 1995.

*Definitely check out the Cottage Company link, they now have a 180 degree video tour of their model home on the main page. Yum!

A Small Jewel Box of a House

Years ago, I saw my first Henry Doelger-built home on Flickr and immediately had to know more. A book, Little Boxes by Rob Keil, was published two years ago that has even more delicious photos of these funky little houses. In fact, a whole group of these mid-century designs preside in the Westlake neighborhood of Daly City, a suburb of San Francisco.

These houses were built by Doelger's firm but designed by a small group of architects who must have loved their jobs from the look of the designs. Just check out what they did to the garage doors.

Westlake Garage Doors 1958-1965

It must have been great to have that much artistic freedom. When was the last time you noticed a garage door, let alone it actually looked different than all the other garage doors.

Another great thing about this book is that it includes my favorite thing, FLOOR PLANS! Yes, I love floor plans, especially of small homes. I enjoy studying the beauty of their clean uncluttered spaces and in these cases, their efficiency in design. It is strange how much I love these things.

You should also check out the Westlake section of the official Daly City history site that Rob collaborated on, this was where I received my first dose of Doelger background.

The Little Boxes Book website also has links to articles on Doelger architect Ed Hageman, who designed the "fish and chips" house shown at top. In addition, the site provides tips and resources for restoring and taking care of a Doelger-built home and its period fixtures and materials. This kind of information could be valuable for anyone owing a mid-century abode or just trying to emulate one.

If you have any information on these homes, (you know someone involved in the construction, who lived in one of the houses, or you posses vintage photos or film footage of these homes, I'm sure Rob would love to hear from you at robertjkeil@yahoo.com.

Source: all pictures from littleboxesbook.com.

Gulf Coast ReBuilding

Read about the effort, volunteerism, and construction of this family's new Pass Christian, MS home in an inspiring story from Cottage Living magazine.
The local organization, Mercy Housing and Human Development partnered with Lowe's, Cottage Living, the Mennonite Disaster Service, and the Gulf Coast Community Foundation in the project. If you feel inspired to help, donate to the Cottage Living Building Fund through the Gulf Coast Community Foundation.

Ocean Springs Cottage Square in Ocean Spring, MS. The development was designed by local firm, Tolar LeBatard Denmark Architects and has won a 2007 Charter Award.

New Orleans' Projects

Here is a great New York Times article and slide show about the variety of design styles being used to rebuild New Orleans.

From the article, the sentiment I completely agree with is this statement:
"Among the ideas advanced by architects and urban planners is permitting New Orleans to come back as a smaller city, with some heavily flooded areas left undeveloped; commissioning innovative 21st-century architecture for new public and residential buildings, even as the city’s treasured historic structures are preserved; and rebuilding low-income housing on higher ground."

The uproar that the city/state would even suggest not rebuilding some of the flooded areas seemed more political than sensible. Why even take the chance of this tragedy happening again? Some low lying areas should be left alone as they will always be too dangerous. This does not mean those people should not be provided housing in New Orleans, just that it should not be there.

 
The Tulane Gravier and Tremé/Lafitte New Orleans neighborhoods are to be reconstructed with help from Providence Community Housing and Enterprise Community Partners.
UrbanBuild N.O.'s Central City area project designed and built by the Tulane School of Architecture in conjunction with Neighborhood Housing Services of New Orleans.

 

Photo courtesy of JetsonGreen.org
Global Green USA, Brad Pitt, and the Home Depot Foundation project in the Lower Ninth Ward Holy Cross** area. Each home will cost about $150,000. Applicants must have previously owned property in the ward to be eligible and will be expected to contribute whatever they can afford.

In my personal opinion, these last two groups missed an important component in developing these environmentally sustainable and modern designs for the people of the Gulf Coast. They forgot to honor and preserve the history, attitude of the area and its people. I am a strong supporter of the green building movement, but in this case, I think more emphasis should have been focused on the importance of the exterior design of these projects. I was strongly disappointed in the designs as I see no connection to the regional architecture of the homes that they will be replacing.

**As of 11.21.07, the first home in Holy Cross (which will be used as a visitors center) has not been finished. More information via this incredible site from the neighborhood, HelpHolyCross.org.

Rebuilding the Gulf Coast Stronger

I have been wanting to write about this for over a year but had no idea of how to approach it. I have friends who were evacuated during Hurricane Katrina but they were lucky to live at a higher elevation and sustained minimal damage to their home when compared to those whose homes were flooded, submerged, or completely destroyed.
In October of 2005, the Mississippi Renewal Forum was created to respond to the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina and its massive loss of residents' homes. Here is a great article from Katrinacottages.com about the effort behind the creation of emergency hurricane resistant and affordable housing solutions for those people.

One of the assignments during the Forum was to “develop designs for affordable housing, which could be immediately put into place while respecting the place upon which it would be built”, in this case the architecture of the Gulf Coast states. It was that last part of the statement that impressed me.

The first design created from that forum was the beautiful, affordable, and historically sensitive Cusato Cottage designed by Marianne Cusato. The beauty of this design is that those needing quick housing could create an affordable, well-constructed, yet quickly built home that complies with the latest hurricane safety requirements. For her efforts, Ms. Cusato won the first Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt People's Design Award in 2006 for her Katrina cottage design.

It was a downsized version of the Mississippi coastal-style house, designed as an alternative to the FEMA trailer. Unlike the FEMA trailer, this cottage and other designs offered, are meant to be permanent structures and "are designed to withstand hurricanes, since we know that they will continue to occur," Cusato said.

FEMA trailer interior
Cusato cottage interior

Ms. Cusato started small; the original design was only 308 square feet*, but it was designed so that as these residents regained their lives, the cottages could be easily expanded, having possible additions already built into the plans. An example is the KC 612, "this 2-bedroom cottage with 1-bathroom starts at 612-sq.-ft. and can expand over time to a 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom 1,080-sq.-ft. house with a family room." The materials for the house average about $55 per sq. ft., so that the KC 612 house would cost $33,660, before labor costs.

The designs of Ms. Cusato, Andres Duany, Eric Moser, and others are available to everyone through Lowe's Katrina Cottage building plans. The eleven plans available from Lowe's range from a 544 square foot 2-bedroom to 1,807 square feet for a 5-bedroom cottage.

• Katrina Cottage types available through Lowes.

• A comprehensive list and descriptions of Katrina Cottages types available through other sources.

*According to this 11/06 New York Times article, Ms. Cusato actually lived in a 11 by 28 foot, 308 square foot apartment when she was designing the first cottage.

4 Sources for Small-scale Homes

Last year, I wrote about Ross Chapin Architect-designed homes. I love the look of their designs. They are so beautiful that I can see selling ALL of my furniture and starting over just to honor the house designs as they should be done.

Three Gable - 1,573 sq ft, 2 bedroom, 1 1/2 bath
Kaleah - 1,579 sq ft, 3 bedroom, 2 3/4 bath
Plumrose - 1,704 sq ft, 3 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath
Vinnlee - 2,111 sq ft, 3 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath

Each of these homes have covered porches and deck space included in those measurements. What I love so much about their home designs are the beauty of their storage solutions, they use every inch as efficiently as possible. The details in their work; whether decorative or structural, are gorgeous. Just look at some of these details:



Have you heard of Tumbleweed Houses, developed by Jay Shafer? Well, you probably have since he lives in an 100 square foot home. He sells plans for structures that size and a bit bigger, from 70 to 120 sq ft. However, I noticed that they now have a fairly large home on their site, at 770 sq feet, it has two bedrooms, closets, and 1 1/2 baths. Isn't it just too cute?

The Enesti

The Bungalow Company has compiled a great collection of small homes within their already modest group of designs. As they say on the site these homes are "designed on a generally smaller scale (1,500 - 2,000 sq feet) for efficient use of space." At this time, these designs are being offered as jumping-off plans for a more affordable custom home design option. Ultimately they hope these designs will become prototypes for new house plans.


Foxtail - 1,201 sq ft, 2 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath
Zinnia - 1,708 sq ft, 2 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath

Another company I discovered on the web is Tightlines and their small house designs (1,000-1,600 sq ft) in North Carolina. Their site shows illustrations, floor plans, and actual homes constructed from those plans. I especially love that their designs have already received approval from the NC State Historic Preservation Office!


Hinton - 1,121 sq ft
Monique - 1,190 sq ft

Small Homes that Live Large

I love how small homes, not McMansions, are getting more popular. Of course, what is considered small is relative. My idea of small would be someone else's idea of a shack. But what is important is that some people truly get it. That with the world currently holding more than 6.5 billion people, in order to preserve our natural resources we will have to get used to living smaller, living slower, using less, and using more responsibly. Of course, those can be two different issues, 1) a small house and 2) a Green house and more power to the people who achieve both goals in one.

I will be tackling the Small issue. Last week in the bookstore, I saw this great magazine, The Best of Fine Home Building magazine Small Homes that Live Large homes under 2,500 sq. ft (catchy title, huh?) It is only available on the magazine stand. The designs within are great, even though I think 2,500 sq ft is pushing the description of small. They have also published
More Small Houses, a compilation of 31 articles they have printed on the small home in the past.

The 720 sq. foot house above is the Bartlett Cottage house plan by Ross Chapin Architects, an architectural firm in Washington state. They design and build homes (small homes, bungalows, cottages) that seem like the type where neighbors borrow cups of sugar to make brownies that they then share with their neighbors at the block party later. They range in size from 700 sq ft of heated space to 2,400 sq ft. I believe their smallest is the Betty Lu at 708 sq ft. It is a one story house, consisting of a bedroom, living room, covered patio, dining alcove, small study and an open kitchen.

Tiny but well designed.

Credits: Floor plan and all home photos are from Ross Chapin Architects.

Here is the big picture

This is the kind of house I want to buy in the future.

When visiting my father a month ago, I noticed this new house going up a few blocks away. I was surprised to see a bungalow. I thought most new builds were much bigger houses with "great rooms" and two-car garages. It was comforting to see that some people still choose to live smaller, simpler lives.

Check out:
Chicago Bungalow Association
American Bungalow magazine
1912 Bungalow house blog