- LEAD ARCHITECT : Tom Kundig, FAIA
- LOCATION & YEAR : Mazama, WA, 2007
Responding to the owner’s need for space to house visiting friends and family, the Rolling Huts are several steps above camping, while remaining low-tech and low-impact in their design. The huts sit lightly on the site, a flood plain meadow in an alpine river valley. The owner purchased the site, formerly a RV campground, with the aim of allowing the landscape return to its natural state. The wheels lift the structures above the meadow, providing an unobstructed view into nature and the prospect of the surrounding mountains.
The huts are grouped as a herd: while each is sited towards a view of the mountains (and away from the other structures), their proximity unites them. They evoke Thoreau’s simple cabin in the woods; the structures take second place to nature. Rental information for the Huts is available at www.rollinghuts.com [From to : http://www.tinyhousedesign.com]
New Take On Rolling Tiny Houses
Posted January 28th, 2009 by Michael Janzen and filed in Projects
My buddy Ryan spotted this project in a recent WSJ (Wall Street Journal Magazine), a surprising place to find an article on tiny houses. These were designed by architect Tom Kundig and serve as guest houses on a remote property in Washington State. The 44-acre property had a zoning issue and a grandfather clause saying that only RV hookups were allowed. Instead of trying to get a variance approved the owner and architect decided to put the houses on big steel wheels and plug the houses into RV hookups. This is an excellent example of how local lemons (zoning requirements) can be turned into lemonade (out-of-the-box solutions).
The cost of each building was about $75,000. The interior square footage is 200 square feet with an additional 240 square feet on the exterior deck. The structure is a mixture of steel, glass, and wood. The end result is a very spacious loft-like modern building.
While I think these are a beautiful work of architecture I’m not sure it’s the most practical design in terms of low cost or low impact. I am certain that there are tons of excellent ideas here though, for example the wheels to circumvent a zoning restriction and the open steel structure in a tiny house. The roof is also designed to hold snow adding to the insulation. I just hope the clearstory window is super insulated or all that heat will just float away.
See this project on the architect’s website. Be sure to poke around their website. I noticed quite a few innovative looking smaller homes.
Photo Credit Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects
From to : http://www.oskaarchitects.com
