House 3 (HOUSE-A-WEEK)

by JodyBrown on July 26, 2012

So, I’ve been designing a house a week for the last few weeks. Mainly, to keep the creative juices flowing, but also because I think designing homes is the best way to think through what is really important to us: the way we live, the way we relate to each other, etc. There really isn’t any form of design more intimate and revealing than individual homes.

So. here’s a bonus house for this week. I designed this one a few months ago. But, I spent a few hours today working on it to pull it together. This one is really tiny (only 770 s.f.) I was thinking this would make a good accessory house, or carriage house behind a main house. This kind of home could work well as a mother in-law suite, or maybe a good place for a college-age kid to move back to be closer to their parents. I hear it’s hard to find work out there lately, right? It seems like families are starting to move back together lately because of the economy. And, I actually think this is a good pattern. I know my family has been thinking about this a lot lately as our parents age. Like most people, our family is spread all over the country and it seems to get harder and hard to make time to visit. Plus, we have a son with a disability, so traveling is getting harder and harder for us. As I get older, I seem to be valuing family more and more. It would be great to have some options for living closer together. I imagine this is an issue a lot of us are struggling with.

Please let me know what you think of this one! (comment sections right down there)

Jody

HOUSE TYPE: one bedroom 1-1/2 bath

SIZE: 770 square feet (16′x28′)

FEATURES: 2-story living space, fireplace, loft-type bedroom, rain water catchment.

  • Keith

    Love it! I owned a mid-terrace cottage just outside Edinburgh, Scotland that was just about the same size – I miss the simplicity of clear, unpretentious, appropriately scaled living accommodation.

    • http://www.coffeewithanarchitect.com/ Jody Brown

      Thanks Keith! I think I daydream of living this simple. Then I wake up and remember that I have 3 kids….
      J

  • kris

    Nicely scaled Jody. It would be great if all Zoning boards would allow ‘accessory’ to be current with these thoughts on how families could live closer.

    • http://www.coffeewithanarchitect.com/ Jody Brown

      So true. Here in Durham the zoning allows for accessory buildings, BUT when you dig into the details the size requirements make a livable house hard to achieve. This tiny house would be too big to meet the code. It seems to be allowed in name only, not in real practice.

      • http://twitter.com/mikedbennett Mike Bennett

        If you connect the accessory house with a continuous covered walkway [roof] couldn’t you argue that it is an attached addition and not an accessory by definition? Love the house.

  • http://twitter.com/atechno David Cuthbert

    excellent… would love to see it expand into a two bedroom, 1 bath

  • Beth

    My mother and I have had a long running joke (not really) that when she was ready, I would move her to my house. I would buy one of those pre-fab sheds (a nice one) from Lowe’s and make a covered walkway into the house so she could come in for her meal. We trade garden shed pictures when we find nice ones. This is even better, but as you say, doesn’t fit our current code (although a neighbor is putting in something that looks very similar in size…he must know someone on the zoning board).

    I’m no architect, so I can’t speak eloquently about it in your language, but it’s pretty and looks comfortable. I like this layout, I really like the bright, airy windows and how that opens up the small space. Maybe when mom moves in I can have you design us one.

    • http://www.coffeewithanarchitect.com/ Jody Brown

      Thanks B!

      I need to dig into the zoning again, it’s changed in the last year, but it used to be based on the size of the main house… something like 1/3 the size of the main building as a max size. which is really odd because there’s no real limit if it’s a attached addition.
      Oh, and check out these for some little more house ideas –
      http://rosschapin.com/Plans/Cottage/1plansCottagespage.html

  • Joy

    As a person old enough to be on Medicare, I can tell you there’s a growing need for backyard in-law apartments. However, for an aging population, stairs can be an issue. Other design I’d like to see: a home for two (or more?) single older people (good friends, but not sharing a bed) with some private and some shared space.

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