Sarah Susanka Draws the Line

Sarah Susanka

For all of you who appreciate Sarah Susanka's championing of the "Not So Big"house, you may be happy to know that she is expanding the brand. Susanka has taken houses from the "Not So Big" books and packaged the drawings of them. She is selling those drawings at the website houseplans.com.

Now you can build your own Not So Big house. However the Not So Big drawings are not so cheap, costing $5,000 to $6,500. For individuals who have no wish for a custom home, who can read detailed drawing, who know how to select and bid out a job to qualified contractors, who feel they know the wealth of fixtures and materials to chose from and who are savvy enough manage and respond to the contractor during complexity of construction, this may be a fine solution. For those who are less inclined to take on all of these responsibilities, consider hiring an architect.

Susanka, one of the innovative thinkers in the field of home design, has always emphasized quality over quantity. That's a good reason why many follow her. She has also changed the way people think about the value and integration of space for daily living. Her skill in using color, enhances space in way that is hard to match. Susanka has brought so much to the housing scene. Her success is a tribute to her manner of communicating ideas, as well as the usefulness of them. Susanka is a big gift from the not so big design genie.

Small Sag Harbor Shelter

A great example of creating interior design cohesion even when creating zones within a small space.

The Tiny House Movement Gets Bigger

Tumbleweed Weebee at Sunset

The above house is the same one pictured in this New York Times article reviewing the tiny house movement. Rather than being earthbound on a quiet evening at sunset, as it is shown above, the NYT shows the house rolling headlong down a ramp and into the busy traffic of a Los Angeles expressway. The photo offers a symbolic statement of the status of the Tiny House moving right into the flow of the modern world.

The Tiny House movment is not new. It has been a cultish delight ever since Henry David Thoreau first went into the woods and declared the virtues of simplicity. Anyone who knows us, knows of our commitment to the "Not So Big House." The emerging publicity and adoration for the really Tiny House is gratifying to see. Though few of us could live in one, still, they remind us of reducing our acquisitiveness and simplifying our lives. They can provide space for a myriad of uses: studios, retreats, garden escapes, mountain get-a-ways, writing space, music room, etc.

Design Boom recently offered a link to modern Tiny Houses, some of which are quite cool. For those who prefer an urban feel, the tiny house movement has not ignored your sensibilities. No longer will you have to settle for the narrow, bird house look of the traditional tiny house. There are options.


We invite you to view this video created by National Geographic. It features the small, now famous, Penguin House designed by Yasuhiro Yamashita in Tokyo. Yamashita took an extremely small footprint, even for Tokyo standards, and created the illusion of space with high ceilings, wise sight lines, and well-placed windows.

Finally, above, courtesy of the blog Miss Modular, one of our secret delights, is a boxcar called home. The ultimate eco-decision: adaptive reuse. Roll this thing right to Boise, Battle Creek or...Baltimore, you've got a home. We will continue to cover this unique and inspiring movement. The time could not be better.