This post is all about creating the best tiny home designs.
When designing your tiny home there is A LOT to think about. And there is a lot you just don’t know. I have lived tiny for the last 5 years. I started in a small travel trailer for 18 months, then moved into a renovated motor home for 3ish years and have just recently moved into a HUGE tiny home. Every time we move or change up our tiny home I learn so much about what to do (and not to do.) Here we have compiled 13+ pointers for creating the best tiny home designs possible.
Do Your homework
Before we get into the tips of building a tiny home consider in depth if you want a tiny home and what kind of tiny home you want. For mobile options there are trailers, remodeled travel trailers, motor homes, remodeled motor homes, buses and vans. Or do you just want a tiny stationary home? There are also the tiny homes that can move but you aren’t going to move ALL the time, such as the storage container homes or some of the converted sheds, or a yurt. Do you want off grid, on grid, or non electric?
With the lifestyle you have/want what kind of living situation will serve you best. Are you home a lot or do you just need a place to sleep? Are you trying to save money? Pursue a simpler life? Not all tiny homes are simpler or more economical or whatever you are looking for, so think through what you want and what kind of “tiny” will suit you.
Try Out Tiny Homes
This is the best piece of advice I can give anyone who is looking to build/buy a tiny home. Try out tiny homes! All kinds, designs, shapes and sizes! Book a couple nights on Airbnb, or if you have a friend with one ask to stay in theirs. There are things you will have no idea you don’t like or like until you try living in them. You will learn so much about the best tiny home designs!
We have remodeled our tiny home 3 different times, and every time there is something I think I will love that I don’t end up liking and changing. Save yourself the headache and the money, try out different tiny homes.
Prioritize Space
I lived in a tiny home with a TINY kitchen that was poorly designed. So when my husband and I decided to build our own tiny home I designed a much, much larger kitchen. Your lifestyle will determine what parts of your tiny home are what size. We eat and cook mainly at home, so a big kitchen is a high priority for us, where as a large living space or luxuries bathroom might be more important to other people.
Simulate Tiny Homes
Beyond just staying in tiny homes, simulate a tiny home design you are considering BEFORE you start building it. Try living in only a portion of your big house. Tape off size of counter you are planning in your tiny home and only use that amount of counter.
Another thing to experiment with is living with only the amount of stuff you can fit in your tiny home design. Storage is a big deal in tiny homes and downsizing the amount of stuff you have is a MUST. Experiment to find out what you want to live with and what stuff you can let go.
Full Time or Part TIme?
Whether you are living in the space full time or part time will be a huge contributor to how you design your tiny home. If you are part time in the space you might make the bedroom and bathroom a bit roomier and compromise on the kitchen and storage. If you you are full time you might make the desk and kitchen and living areas more of a priority.
Easy to Build?
When designing your tiny home consider how easy it will be to build. Think about things like water lines, power and gas lines. Our tiny home is designed that all the water lines are on one side of the tiny home and that makes things much easier to build.
Be Careful of “multiPurpose” or “convertable” spaces
Convertible spaces are everywhere in tiny homes design. It may be a sofa that can fold up and make way for a table, or some clever gimmick that hides your bed and makes room for your desk, there are many ways to make a multipurpose space. These spaces can be great if they are designed well, but more often than not they don’t. These spaces don’t end up getting used, or end up being a headache to get in and out. I would especially avoid using multipurpose or convertible spaces in smaller tiny homes. Try your dead level best to have a space that doesn’t require any “converting” to work for you.
INterior Design that Hides Dirt
A surprising fact about tiny homes is that they are exceptionally dirty. They are somewhat fast to clean because they are small, but they are even faster to get dirty because they are small. White and light colored interiors are SO pretty, but they aren’t that practical from a cleaning perspective. Avoid solid patterned or really light or dark colored flooring, as this makes dirt pop. Choose rugs and furniture that are easy to clean. Do yourself a favor and make interior design choices that hide dirt well.
Have COunterSpace on Both SIdes Of the Kitchen SInk
This is for my people out there who plan on cooking a lot in your tiny home, counter space on both sides of the kitchen sink is critical!
DOwnSize your belongings appropriately
The downsize in living space should have a corresponding downsize in stuff. Plan on downsizing your belongings immensely. The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo is a great guide that can help you downsize, plus her folding techniques are the BEST I have been able to find and the only ones that work well in our tiny home. You can order your copy here on Amazon. Even the best tiny home designs can’t solve the problem of too much stuff being shoved in them.
Plan Out Your Storage in Detail
I am not a details person per se, but one area of my life I swear by being detailed in is tiny home storage. Know were EVERYTHING goes. If you don’t have a space specifically set aside for it, it will end up where you don’t want it. Know where charging chords live, where phones live, where pots and pans, books, clothes, dresses, everything. Drawing up a map of where you will store everything and living by it will help you have the best tiny home designs possible.
Don’t Be Afraid of OPen SPaces
There can be an urgency to fill every space in your tiny home with something! But it can be a breath of fresh air and can actually make your tiny home feel bigger, if there is a space that is open. Even if there are other parts of the home that are smaller or “less” because of that open space, the whole home will feel better because of that open, roomy place.
Be Nice: Give Yourself Decent Walkways
Access is golden. In our first tiny home the walkway was so narrow in one part of the kitchen that only one of us could be cooking/cleaning at a time and that was annoying. It can be tempting to keep making your walkway smaller and smaller, do yourself a favor and try to keep your walkways at least three feet wide. You can live with less, but more is better:)
Have An ENd Game FOr Your TIny Home
When designing your tiny home, plan on what you are going to do with it when you are done. Our first tiny home we built very economically, but didn’t consider what we were going to do with it when were were done with it. Do we throw it away? Rent it out? Park it? Sell it? Looking back we would have put a little more money into something a bit nicer that we could have sold or rented out when we were done living in it. Let the end game plan help guide your design choices and get the best tiny home designs possible.
Check out the homesteading resource page for more awesome books and resources on homesteading!