Ex Hong Kong Architect’s Family Tiny House

so many of us are attracted to the idea of small space living and seeking out a better quality of life by reducing overheads and today we're about to meet a woman who has done just that by building a beautiful tiny house for her family [Music] hey bobby lovely to see you too bryce and it is lovely to see your beautiful tiny home yep thank you so first of all what was it that actually inspired you to build a tiny house i'm wanting somewhere affordable warm and dry for me and my kids after separation so tiny house was the answer and i didn't realize how long it would take to actually make it happen but uh fortunately the universe aligned and a friend offered me finance so i just jumped it was meant to be now you actually have a background in architecture don't you that's right i studied architecture in auckland i worked in asia for about 15 years doing architecture very big projects and i just really craved coming back home to build myself a house so 20 years later here we are yeah really interesting what you've done here with the raked wall yep that was to get extra space without um extending the trailer deck so my loft cantilevers out a little bit over there so what size is this tiny house the base deck of the house is 7.6 and it cantilevers out to about 9 metres at the top so it's no more than 3.1 external width and then i really like what you've done here with extending the living space into the outdoors and you've got some really cool container gardens happening here too this is my daughter's uh nursery so she's planning a big business lovely and so this here is for rabbits is it uh we used to have guinea pigs but now it's the lizard summer house blue spends sunny days out there yeah you've got a lizard in the house we do yeah a blue tongue lizard the kids will probably introduce you to him later that is super cool and you have found quite a beautiful parking space for the tiny house here as well haven't you yeah very fortunate that i've been working with the owner on another project so it was a very last minute thing to see if i could actually join a friend to move on to the orchard and it's just the perfect spot to be yeah because i see you're here with another tiny house as well which is really cool yep yep little community brilliant and can you tell me a little bit about the materials that you've chosen for the tiny house okay so i've worked with cedar before and i like the idea that i don't have to oil it i love the silvering off of it being a nice light natural material japanese seeder from a local sawmill the windows i was really hoping to use timber but we had such a short time frame the only supplier i could get to make me windows and time was pvc i was very hesitant with the big wide frames i thought they're too chunky and clumsy but i actually really love them so i'm really happy with those and you've got these wonderful feature entrance doors as well yep they were a last-minute purchase from a demo yard in auckland so i had to actually change the steel framing on site because it wasn't to the original design that is one of the challenging factors when you're working with steel is that if you have to change anything on the design it's so unforgiving isn't it yes yep but we made it well the house looks really great from the outside and i am very interested to see what you've done inside should we check it out come on in thank you very much oh this is lovely what you've done here with the ceiling is really beautiful that timber is gorgeous yeah this is reclaimed remo that i bought from a demo yard in christchurch it was 60 thick boards by about four or five meters long when i got it brought up here the guy the sawmill split it into 16 mil for the floor and 12 mil for the ceiling so out of all those boards of rimu we split into use for all the furniture you can see the steps and the ceiling and the floor that is lovely remy really is such a beautiful warm timber isn't it yeah so obviously as an architect you've had a lot of experience with a lot of different kinds of spaces what was it like actually working on a tiny house project well i've done a lot of small space design in hong kong for very compact apartments typically you'd have a whole family in 30 40 square meters maybe two generations even so the key for me is really providing lots of storage as invisible as possible to maintain a sense of space and you know trying to make space out of nothing for example my windows which are cantilever mini bay windows they're also shelves and i know a lot of other designers use a lot of moving parts which i think are amazing but with young children i didn't want to go there fair enough too and what you've done with that window there really is very clever because it does act as storage but it also really kind of just draws you into this part of the home doesn't it this was actually designed as a day bed with storage underneath you know the idea that we'd all be lounging on top and with things that i didn't use that often and were stored underneath and that's the only thing i've really changed about the house i thought i'd rather have open space than storing stuff we didn't need right so i've shrunk it recently to over here and we're really enjoying having just a bean bag knock at the moment for watching movies and things nice and cozy absolutely and is that where the lizard lives that's where blue lives he's hiding right now but he might come out later today very cool and again you can really see here that in this space you have built in a tremendous amount of storage haven't you uh there's a lot of storage still i could add more but i feel like we're already seeing too much stuff so i'm still on a constant effort to try to reduce what is in the house and then above us here we've got your sleeping loft that's right it's just basically a queen mattress sunken into the depth of the shelf there i didn't need privacy but in the case i do i just add a curtain up there but for now i love it being open and the kids usually spend time out there and it really is cool the way that you've created the access to the sleeping loft through these storage stairs there yeah that's it again just being multifunctional so looking good and serving a purpose lovely open skylight yeah i think they really make the space so open i could have even done without side windows or one of them because it's just lets in so much light yeah and then over here we have your kitchen and i really like what you've done here by adding the table in here as well yeah that was about having the workbench and dining table and also somewhere for the kids to spread out and do their crafts and so on and especially living in a tiny house together as a family having a place where you can all sit down together and eat meals is so nice isn't it yeah pretty important and again i didn't want moving parts you know things you had to convert every time you sat down so it's always there yeah and so tell me about the design of the kitchen here and what you've got in terms of appliances so kitchen basically i've got a double gas hob because i love cooking with gas in retrospect i should have given it a bit more space so i can actually use a wok there's not really enough room there for a walk i have a dishwasher which i really missed for three years before we moved in so i'm glad i've got a dishwasher i don't have an oven because i don't bake or cook all that much the kitchen storage is basically a toolbox oh so once i discovered these i just looked around all the supplies and found one that was perfect for us and the most useful thing is a craft drawer for the kids where all their stuff goes so there's always somewhere to put it that is such a good idea and i feel like i can sit here and i'm kind of in my cockpit and i don't need to move anywhere you want some water i need to empty the dishwasher without even getting up brilliant so we have fitted the plumbing for a washing machine in here but for now i'm just using it as storage and i use the laundromat i'm hoping eventually when we're in a community we actually have a shared laundry yeah it's a good idea and talking about the space here you have built-in again a lot of storage under the stairs here haven't you yep so there's 70 deep i wanted to be able to hang things and also hang stuff on the door so having that extra depth to have a layer of uh storage on the door as well as the drawers and so on inside great idea and then behind here we have your bathroom that's why it's pretty compact oh this is lovely that door is a work of art where did you find that uh this is basically just a water adhesive fill oh wow yes you just spray water on it and it'll stick and it casts amazing rainbow light in the morning when the sun comes through beautiful this is quite a compact bathroom but you've fit a lot of functionality into here haven't you yep so this shop was actually lying on the street when i moved into my last place and i thought that will come in useful because we just renovated and the first thing we got rid of was the shub it's like never again that would have been so useful so i saw this on the street and tucked it away for three years so when i was actually designing the tiny house the bathroom was designed around that shop it never ceases to amaze me the things that people can just find lying on the side of the road that's right yeah beautiful base in there yep i wanted something that was a bit of a feature in the bathroom and just got this on trademe chose it with the kids the taps i ordered from china so this is a sensor tap oh wow so that it's not dripping or left on by the children that is such a good idea yeah and then above us now we've got your kids loft but really really nice stairs that you've designed to access that yeah they were hard work to make but um i think they're really worth the effort they're such a feature and again function and looking good yeah again really really lovely use of that riemu timber and yeah especially against the sort of modern look of the plywood walls and the stark white cabinetry it just does a lot to warm up the space doesn't it yeah it's just beautiful that we've really maximized the amount of timber that i got and used it in so many places yeah absolutely and then i love what you've done here with the climbing wall as well yeah that's one of the requests from the kids they wanted climbing grips and monkey bars across the roof so yeah i think gradually now that there's a bit bigger i'll start adding a couple more so they could get across the whole wall but i find them useful as hand grips for adults going up and down the stairs yep that's very true well should we go upstairs and see the children's room then yeah please oh this is so cool it's especially clever what you've done here by being able to actually fold the beds up and then it creates all of this play space yeah so the idea is they can leave their mess out and fold the beds down on top of it and how did they adapt to living in the tiny house i think they love it they think it's like a big cubby basically i promised my daughter that one of us will have an extra space when she's a teenager so whether it's me or him or her we'll decide and i think that's something that's really important to remember about tiny house living because just like any living space it's adaptable over time and if you need to add an extension or anything you always have the ability to do that later yeah that's right so how long have you been living in the home now oh we've been here on the orchard almost two years coming up august and are you enjoying life in the tiny house i love it yeah i really love this house that we built but knowing it's not permanent spot i'm always looking for where we're going to be permanently but just really enjoying where we are for now yeah and so can you talk to me a little bit about the cost that was involved in building this home so i was kind of aiming for somewhere around 60 to 80 000 but in the end it's come out to about 140 i would say plus a lot of my unskilled hours into that yeah so that's probably added a year onto my repayments but at the same time i think you know would i do anything differently apart from paying someone else to build it no i love all the materials and everything we've got in here having this small home for me and my family to me means freedom and comfort and soon you know the goal really is to have low overheads which means i have choices in what i do with my time you know where i need to make money and where i don't and having less stress in our lives is the most important thing you know it just gives you space to think about what else you can do with your time and your life and the people who matter and what matters to us you know so i think time and freedom is something that money can't play that's a choice well bobby you really have created such a beautiful home here i love all of the functionality that you've put into it and especially the way that you've given so much thought and attention to creating this as a place which is wonderful for your children and where you can all live together as a family thank you so much for sharing it with me you're welcome bobby really has created such a wonderful home here for her and her children ultimately it's about creating financial freedom it's about creating a lifestyle of your choosing and making decisions that are based on what you truly innately want and that really is a beautiful thing you

Channel: Living Big In A Tiny House

Views: 1,417,047

Rating: 4.9214463 out of 5

Keywords: living big in a tiny house, tiny house, small house, small space design, architecture, architect tiny house, alternative living, small spaces, family tiny house, tiny house with children, tiny house tour, tiny house new zealand, tiny house living, tiny house 2020, home design, hong kong architecture, small space living

Id: mTu5EjTO7Nc

Length: 13min 45sec (825 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 16 2020