Tumbleweed Tiny House Company: On Tour until June 13th
Until June 13th, tiny house architect Jay Shafer is on a road trip of a different kind. By popular demand, Shafer has hitched up Fencl, a 130 square foot home on wheels (pictured below), and is trekking across the country. Shafer’s tour takes Fencl from San Francisco to New York City, with open houses and building and design workshops scattered along the way. At the end of its journey, having proved its durability, the charming little house will be delivered to a desiring tiny house occupant in the New York area.
What are the benefits of a house like this? Lately, Shafer has been referring to small houses as “foreclosure busters.” With low upkeep costs, extremely cheap utility bills ($65 a year has been done), and no mortgage, Shafer’s homes are, indeed, hard to resist. Shafer also emphasizes the versatility of tiny, transportable homes. Not only can they be designed to circumvent some of the more aggravating complexities of current housing laws, but also they need not be conceived only as permanent residences. According to Shafer, small houses are terrific eco-conscious stand-ins for traditional vacation homes, they are ideal work studios, and they can even be tacked on to traditional homes as freestanding additions. And in high-risk geographies, the transportability of Shafer’s homes might yet be leveraged to fill a completely undersaturated market niche. After hurricane Katrina, displaced Mississippi resident Julie Martin collaborated with Shafer to develop a Gulf Coast Model. Needing only an electrical outlet and a garden hose, this model allows people to quickly evacuate coastal regions without abandoning their homes. Shafer’s other designs range from 65 to 837 square feet, so they can satisfy a range of housing needs. In short, if Shafer is passing through your area in the coming days, you won’t want to miss his open houses and workshops.
Here is the tour schedule from the Tumbleweed Tiny House Blog:
Tue May 26 – Reno, NV 6:00 pm
Wed May 27 – Salt Lake, UT 6:00 pm
Thu May 28 – Cheyenne, WY 6:00 pm
Sat May 30 – Boulder, CO 5:30 pm
Tue June 2 – Omaha, NE 6:00 pm
Wed June 3 – Des Moines, IA 12:00 noon
Wed June 3 – Iowa City, IA 6:00 pm
Sat June 6 – Chicago, IL 5:30 pm
Mon June 8 – Indianapolis, IN 6:00 pm
Tue June 9 – Cincinnati, OH 12:00 noon
Tue June 9 – Columbus, OH 6:00 pm
Wed June 10 – Pittsburgh, PA 6:00 pm
Thu June 11 – Philadelphia, PA 6:00 pm
Sat June 13 – New York, NY 5:30 pm
(For a more detailed list of open house and workshop locations, look here.)
Via Tumbleweed Tiny House Company and NPR
Images courtesy of Jay Shafer of the Tumbleweed Tiny House Company
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One Comment, Comment or Ping
chris young
You need bring a tour to Dallas & Ft Worth, Texas.
I believe you would receive a good response. I wait
to here answer.
Your Friend;
Chris Young
Jun 13th, 2009
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