Tiny House with Moving Walls – part 2

In the first round of playing with the idea of moving walls I based the design on a 16′ by 16′ footprint. Since I like challenges I decided to go smaller this time but keep the same requirements of being livable for a happy couple with the occasional visit of another couple for dinner. This tiny house design concept is 144 square feet, a room 12′ by 12′. Like the first round, the roof and walls construction could be anything.

(side note: I changed the scale from the last drawing to make it easier for me to draw, so if you compare the drawing in part 1 you’ll notice the difference. Both are to scale, just different scales.)

Overall Concept

The bathroom is smaller. Its now 3′ by 7′. The shower would be a full 3×3 shower stall with a shower curtain; the sink would be a small pedestal or wall hung unit; and the toilet would be a small composting toilet with a remote collection tank. I took the dimensions of this little toilet from an Envirolet composting toilet. You could use another small footprint toilet too if composting toilets are not your thing.

Only one wall/cabinet moves in this design but I’m making use of two sets of murphy bed hardware to get as much function out of the smaller space. One would be used for a queen size bed and the other would be used for a small sofa on the opposite wall. One of my blog visitors, Carey, sent me some ideas and a link to a cool murphy bed manufacturer and it gave me some ideas. Thanks Carey!

On the other side of the cabinet from the queen murphy bed would be a fold-out 36″ by 60″ table. The folding chairs would fit into the cabinet in the upper left corner of the drawing. You’ll notice a hinged panel hiding an empty space and the chair cabinet. This faux panel helps keep the moving wall from looking too big. If a cabinet like this covers a wall completely, from ceiling to floor and wall to wall an illusion is created that the cabinet is more like a wall. If you break holes in the faux wall surface and show it’s depth the cabinet will begin to look like an enormous obstacle in the room destroying the illusion.

Living Room Mode

When the moving wall is closed the room is kitchen-less and would serve as a living room or bedroom. The sofa can be flipped out in kitchen mode or living room mode. If the table and sofa are folded out at the same time getting onto the sofa or chairs around the table may be a bit hard to do.

Kitchen Mode

Open the wall to reveal the kitchen. Flip down the table and set-up the chairs and you’re ready to eat. Just be sure to pull the chairs out of their cabinet before you open the wall.

Bedroom Mode

Finish your evening snack, do the dishes, get your glass of water and then close up the kitchen. Then flip up the sofa and flip down the queen bed. The bathroom is accessible in any mode of course… ‘nature calls mode’ waits for no one to flip-up or flip-out. LOL

Part Three Preview

For the third act I’m going to go bigger, yep leaving ‘tiny house’ behind and venturing into ‘small house’. I think I’ll draw one big room with a bathroom off to the side or in a corner and have multiple moving walls that form several bedrooms. I’ll shoot for a flexible design that will allow from one to three bedrooms, a larger kitchen, and a washer and dryer.

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