designing a smal l l if ew/ macy mil l er
Have you ever f ound yoursel f
wondering why you need al l t hat space?
Macy Miller is locally famous and has
received national press as the ?Tiny
House Lady.? She?s been living in a tiny
house of her own construction for more
than two years. How tiny, you ask?
?232 square feet now,? Miller says. ?It
used to be 196. We just built an
addition.? By that, she means that she
recently enclosed the back porch. She
shares that tiny footprint with a
daughter, a partner, and a Great Dane.
Miller?s tiny house began as an
educational project that was part of her
Master?s degree in Architecture. ?I
needed a project with all the
components of construction,? she says. ?I
needed to wire something and interact
with plumbing and frame something. So
that?s how I came up with this tiny house
concept. I didn?t know at the time it was
a real thing that people did, it just kind of
made sense for me at that point in my
life.?
Even though 200 square feet sounds like
an impossibly small space for a family to
share, Miller insists it can be done if the
space is designed well around the habits
of its residents. ?A study was done where
they put RFID tags on people and tracked
where they went in their house. People
only really use that much space in their
house, in concentrated areas. If you
design it well and put those spaces
together, it?s not challenging.? Miller
admits that she?s always been a
minimalist, so adapting to a tiny house
lifestyle was easy.
The lifestyle comes with the added
benefit of building community. ?If I need
to get out of the h ouse, I?ll go down to
the coffee shop,? Miller says. ?My living
expenses are quite a bit less than the
average person, so I don?t feel bad about
spending money in the community.?
A common question Miller hears when
she gives seminars on tiny house
construction is: Why don?t you just
retrofit a shed? ?A shed is a
ground-bound structure,? Miller says,
?which is regulated by the building
department and has a different set of
codes than a tiny house has.? Some
locations have a minimum square-foot
requirement for ground-bound
residences. By building on wheels,
usually on a flatbed trailer, a tiny house
is subject to the rules of the
transportation department which allows
6 8
for more compact designs.
Despite being built on a wheeled chassis,
tiny houses are built to regular
construction standards and are better
insulated than an RV or travel trailer. In
fact, Miller notes, many people who have
lived in an RV and hated it enjoy living in
a tiny house. ?The proportions of an RV
are different. A tiny house has the
proportions of a house, with full-size
doors. You?re not squeezing through a
door to get into the bathroom. More
importantly, tiny houses are designed
around the space needs of their owners. I
don?t use a dining room, and just about
every RV has a dining room. That would
be wasted space for me.?
The most common question Miller gets is
about the bathroom. ?There are lots of
different options,? she says. ?The most
common is a composting toilet. That can
be anything from a bucket and sawdust
to the $2500 one I use. Mine is
completely hands-off, off-the-grid, and
certified as a sanitary sewage system,
but mechanically it works the same as a
bucket and sawdust, which is why a lot of
people go that route. There are other
options like incinerating toilets, and you
can absolutely put in a flush toilet if you
want.?
Miller?s tiny house is plumbed for water
and wired for electric, like an average
house. She collects her gray water ? the
relatively clean wastewater from her
shower and sink ? to water her garden.
Her utilities come from a ?host house? on
an adjacent lot from which she runs
water and electric lines and shares the
cost with the homeowner. She?s tested a
variety of heating methods from radiant
floor heat to propane and electric
convection heaters, and writes about her
results with each of them on her blog.
One of the biggest obstacles facing
someone who wants to build their own
tiny house is finding a construction
location. It?s complicated by the dilemma
that lot owners will rent space to park a
tiny house but they want to see the
house first. It often needs to be built
elsewhere. Building on your own
property is a zoning issue, Miller says,
and zoning often won?t enforce rules
unless they?re complained about. In that
case, it?s wise to explain your project to
neighbors and work out any concerns
they have. For pictures and more
information on Macy Miller?s tiny house,
you can check out her personal blog,
minimotives.com. She also writes for
planningtiny.com, a resource site for tiny
house design.