Subject: Re: tiny house

From: [email-masked]
Date: 26 Jul 1995 05:14:06 GMT

>  
>  After 6 1/2 years of living (happily) with my husband and cat on a 33' sailboat,
>  with a cabin sole 18 inches wide, probably similar to an 80 sq. ft. house(?), 
>  our 525 sq ft current home seems IMMENSE! So much wasted space! So much
>  unnecessary "stuff" seems to collect here! 
>  
>  Personally, I would find close proximity to neighbors far more degrading 
>  than the size of my dwelling. Maybe with some personal growth, I can
>  get over that, too.
>  
>>>>
My company designs (among other things) the interiors of lavish and spacious 
super-yachts. But, I am an open-ocean sailor that has long found the effort to derive
enormous utility & comfort from an impossibly small space (on small sailboats) very
challenging and rewarding. I am convinced that the limitation is one of imagination
and context rather than "sq ft".

It is a revelation to apply and explore many of the marine techniques and items 
optimized for these demanding "minimal space/high elegance & appeal" applications. 
And, as they are (usually) at home in the hostile marine environment, they are
usually of a high order of quality and durability.

I presently own a small (1000') home that feels largely empty to me. I am now thinking
of getting rid of this house and building a 600 sq ft addition to my shop building
that would be as elegant and efficient as the 600' architect-designed penthouse 
apartment I once lived in. It is a fascinating game, above all else, to elicit a 
gallon's worth of space fromn a quart container! 

The prospect of a very small dwelling is inherrently dauting only if one has never
seen what can truly be accomplished. It gets even better when one breaks free
of rectilinear thinking and the arbitrary constraints that are articles of faith to the
mainstream construction industry.

Richard Poole
Apollonio & Poole, Naval Architecture & Marine Engineering, Inc.
Bellingham, WA