Building A Microhouse And The Tiny House Movement

We are in the process of building a micro-house at our farm. Our reasoning is that we have a small farm house that our family lives. We have made it work for us, but when people come to visit, there is nowhere for them to stay. My parents like to come visit, my Mom comes from across the country and she likes to stay for a long time and it’s very hard for all of us to coexist. So we started reading about the tiny house movement and think this might be the perfect solution for us.

The tiny house movement, What is it?

Essentially it’s living smaller. Keeping only the important things, having less things, and focusing more on living. Here is a pretty interesting infographic that I found at www.thetinylife.com:

So while we are not necessarily going from our large house into a smaller house, I would like to think of this as a test run. I want to build this house and see if it is possible to make it work. Maybe we could relocate it somewhere else after it serves the purpose of guest living for us?

We had an old spring house (pictured below) that we tore down. Spring houses used to serve two purposes. First, to keep spring water clean by filtering out fallen leaves, animals (I read this part online, gross?), and other debris from getting into the water. Second, the enclosing structure could be used before refrigeration to maintain a constant and cool temperature. We no longer need the spring house for the second purpose, so the structure will be coming down.

In order to keep with the mindset of the tiny house movement we have saved as many of the materials from the spring house that we can and we will reuse and re-purpose them in the construction of the new house. We were able to salvage a lot of the slate roof. We also saved as much of the wood that we could and are thinking about using it on the inside floor or maybe on the walls. At the base of the spring house are very large barn stones. They will stay in place and we will level them and build the structure on top of them. The spring house has natural gas heating, electric is in place, and there is also a water source.

Right now we are working with a space that will be 12 x 15 for the house with a deck going out on either side of the house to add some extra space for sitting or eating when the weather is nice. We are looking at some different ideas for what kind of house we will build. It will be simple and the inside will be one large room with maybe a loft.

The springhouse before we started

Springhouse demo

The deck and flooring going over the barn stone

Another shot of the flooring

This is as far as we are in this process. My husband has ordered rough cut lumber that should be delivered today. He will be putting on the deck to go out on both of the long sides of the deck. We are in the design phase of the house, using an ipad app. I have been busy scouring pinterest to find ideas for inexpensive or recycled materials.

RIght now materials at the top of my list for the floor, the walls, and the ceiling are:

Corrugated Metal

I found this image here, and a bunch more ideas of how to use corrugated metal inside your home.

Plywood

Plywood is super inexpensive and can be used for floors, walls, ceilings, and furniture. Click here for more ideas.

Reclaimed barn wood

We just happen to have a barn with extra barn wood laying around. We are hoping we can re-purpose it on the floor or walls. There are tons of good ideas online. I am excited to figure it out.

I will update periodically on our progress. I would love to hear suggestions from my fellow creative Steemers! If you want to learn how a former city girl ended up on this farm, click here https://steemit.com/life/@jodiegolier/former-city-girl-living-on-a-farm