The Los Angeles Times has a nice photo essay today on the movement to build "tiny" houses. Author Mimi Zeiger has just published a tiny art book on the topic. The movement is sparked by the laudable impulse to reduce the size of our carbon footprint and to pare homes down to the essential. Waste not, want not and all that. The houses featured are daring, beautiful and fanciful. I, for one, love the idea of living in a little cabin on stilts among the primeval treetops. Must check whether my neighborhood is zoned for that. . .
They aren't all practical, however. Horden Cherry Lee Architects' 76-square-foot micro-compact aluminum cube might have two double beds, a kitchen, bath and dining table, but who would want to live in it? It is the residential equivalent of a Smart car, cute as all get out, but really useless when there are three of you needing to get from Point A to Point B in a hurry.(Good luck if you blow a tire on the highway, btw. Smart cars don't come equipped with spare tires.) Tiny, when this small, is a parlor game.
Funny how tiny becomes chic when rich people and their architects adopt it. Tiny houses are just plain "too small" when poor people live in them. I'm still waiting for architects to devise beautiful. compact and architecturally daring small homes for the masses. Now that would be revolutionary.
But enough of my gassing on. Take a look at the LA Times' photo gallery here.
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