Exploring Alternatives

Noah built his own tiny house on wheels 4 years ago and has been living in it every since! It measures 10' x 20' with a total of just 200 square feet of interior living space so it's quite small, but his open concept design makes the space feel super functional and comfortable! Some other things he did to optimize his micro home include a main floor bedroom so that the ceilings are nice and high (no loft), and he also installed lots of windows and a skylight to bring in loads of natural light.

The tiny house has great storage in the entrance with space for coats and shoes, as well as a wardrobe closet for clothing. There's a dining nook with two stools next to the single wall kitchen that has a bar fridge, sink, and propane cooktop, as well as lots of storage for his pantry items and dishes. He also has a deep freezer outside for additional food storage.

There's an L-shaped bench sofa with integrated storage that creates a cozy living room, and a Queen-sized bed with even more storage underneath and a built-in night table.

The bathroom has a standard vanity and flush toilet, but the real show stopper is his cedar strip shower that adds a ton of warmth and character to the small washroom.

Noah used standing seam metal on the roof, cedar channel and cedar shake for the siding, and he insulated the tiny house with a mix of rock wool and rigid insulation.

To double the size of his living space, he added a big deck to the tiny house that's actually modular so he can take it apart if he needs to move. And he also integrated an outdoor bathtub into the deck so that he can enjoy a bath with a view!

After self-building and self-financing this tiny home project, Noah started building tiny homes for a living on Salt Spring Island in British Columbia, Canada and so far he's built 6 tiny homes in total! This one is called the Maxwell and it's the smallest of three models he builds. Another fun project he's started is building mobile saunas!

1 day ago (edited) | [YT] | 165

Exploring Alternatives

Chris and Stef jumped feet first into self-sufficiency when they decided not to buy groceries for an entire year, including staples like salt, sugar, coffee, and flour! For an entire year, they grew, caught, raised, and harvested 100% of their food supply on a small 1/2 acre homestead.

It was fascinating to tour their homestead and to see how they succeeded in completing their year of self-sufficient living. Hope you enjoy watching their story :)

2 weeks ago | [YT] | 137

Exploring Alternatives

Hélène and her partner Alain from Es-Cargo (www.es-cargo.qc.ca/) have lived off-grid in Quebec, Canada in a self-built earthship style home made of recycled tires filled with earth and large south-facing windows.

Their water is gravity fed from a spring-filled cistern placed up the hill from their home, their power comes from solar energy, and they use a composting outhouse toilet.

For refrigeration, they make their own ice during the winter by freezing water in recycled windshield washer jugs outside, and then they store them in a root cellar inside unplugged chest freezers insulated with sawdust. They manage to keep their food cold with these homemade ice blocks from January to July, and then they get ice blocks from a neighbour.

For hot water they use approximately 200 lbs of propane each year.

For heat they have a homemade rocket stove that is an efficient way to burn wood, and they also use it as a cooktop in the winter.

They would eventually like to be self sufficient in their food production and have gardens, hens, and they've begun to build an aquaponic system as well. But they do find that growing all of their own food, running workshops, and staying on top of all their other projects to be an incredible amount of work for just two people.

They're hoping to attract more people to the property to form a small community of inspired and like-minded permaculture enthusiasts.

To learn more about Hélène and Alain's off-grid lifestyle and about any upcoming projects and workshops, you can check out their website and follow them on Facebook:

1 month ago | [YT] | 132

Exploring Alternatives

This man built a beautiful off-grid cabin with the help of friends for $65,000 CAD including the cost of the land. There was no road access to his lot so he had to bring in all of the building materials using a 4-wheeler with a small trailer, and then load them on a material elevator to bring them up a cliff to where he wanted to build his home.

You can find out more about this cabin on Instagram here:
www.instagram.com/canadiancastaway/

The cabin can collect and store 3,000 litres of rainwater from the roof. One of the water tanks is inside the house to prevent the water from freezing during the winter, and the other two are in a shed that is attached to the cabin so that warm air can be circulated with fans to prevent the other two tanks from freezing as well.

For heat, he has a wood stove, and he brings the firewood up to the cabin using the material elevator.

For power, he has a solar power system and a backup generator for cloudy days.

This micro cabin has two lofts, one is a living room, and one is the bedroom. On the main floor is a kitchen with propane 2-burner cooktop and 110 volt fridge, a bathroom with a sink and a bath (but no toilet because he prefers to have the toilet outside), and a spacious living area with the wood stove and dining table.

1 month ago | [YT] | 120

Exploring Alternatives

Check out our latest video about Nick and Lolo who are living in a beautifully handcrafted tiny home on wheels that is filled with character, charm, and cozy vibes. They built it together with help from a friend in just a few months and have been living in it for over 2 years – now with their 11-month old baby! They rent the land they're on, and are fortunate to have space to grow food with their landmates, as well as to grow Lolo's flowers for her floristry business.

The tiny house itself is approximately 300 square feet inside, plus a loft that is accessed with stairs and a drop floor. It was built over-width so it's wider than the average tiny house, which gives it less of a "hallway" feeling inside. There's a spacious living room with a full sized sofa and wood stove, a stunning kitchen with handmade cabinets and retro-style appliances, a walk-through closet for Nick and Lolo's clothes plus linens and towels, and a bathroom with hot pink floor tiles, a bucket style composting toilet and a claw foot bathtub. There's also a ladder in the kitchen to access a guest loft with a single bed (currently used as storage) and a hatch to get up onto the flat roof.

It's built on a 2-axle, 14,000 lbs capacity trailer from Rainbow Trailers in Alberta, Canada. They built the tiny house quite light by sheathing it on the inside and then wallpapering directly onto the sheathing which eliminated the need for interior walls like plaster, wood, or drywall. It is framed on the outside of the sheathing. They also used thinner wood for the floor to save on weight as well.

In total, without counting their own labour and the value of the wood and materials they salvaged/already had, the tiny house construction cost them approx. $40,000 CAD.

One of the coolest things about where their tiny house is parked is that there was an existing 600 square foot deck on the property that used to be the floor of the cabin there. It was at the perfect height for them to pull up the tiny house alongside the deck, and it gives them loads of extra space directly adjacent to the tiny house. They've covered it with a roof and added some side walls to make a great 3-season extension to the tiny house.

1 month ago | [YT] | 88

Exploring Alternatives

This family of 5 has worked hard over the past 13 years to make their off-grid homestead dreams a reality. Their yurt home is connected to a straw bale kitchen and garage, they collect rainwater and solar power, and they heat with an indoor wood boiler that provides in-floor heating.

Their homestead includes sprawling gardens that produce a ton of vegetables, and they also raise pigs, goats, sheep, chickens, quail, rabbits and bees for everything from meat and eggs to feta cheese and honey.

In this video, Becca and Jean share a tour of their alternative home, explain their off-grid systems, talk about the financial and permitting hoops they had to jump through, and share the ups and downs of living this lifestyle.

1 month ago | [YT] | 92

Exploring Alternatives

Pam and Dave bought an old disassembled grain silo and converted it into a stunning round tiny house. They lived off-grid in the home for 4 years using solar power for electricity, a well for water, a composting toilet, and propane for heat and hot water.

The barn home has a small mud room for coats, boots, and cleaning supplies, and then the main round space is an open concept multi-use space with a living room, dining room and a kitchen with a pantry built into the staircase. Upstairs they have a bedroom and a bathroom with special touches like a sun tunnel oculus to bring in natural light, a round cedar tiled floor, and best of all, the stunning round peak ceiling!

Building in a circle was challenging but the couple came up with clever solutions like using tongue and groove wood vertically so that it would go around the circle. They also came up with unique ways of finishing things off, like using rope for trim, and cutting plywood into pie shapes to make the ceiling.

The silo is 500 square feet, and 19 feet in diameter and 20 feet high. It's made up of corrugated metal pieces that are fastened together and it is set up on a heated and insulated concrete pad. The interior has 2x4 stick framing with spray foam insulation.

2 months ago | [YT] | 117

Exploring Alternatives

Growing food in a small garden can produce a surprisingly big harvest, whether it’s on an urban balcony, in a tiny yard, or even on a countertop or windowsill. It feels pretty special to learn and practice the timeless skill of growing your own food and to be able to eat fresh veggies right at home within seconds of picking them. You get to see the full life cycle of it, from seed to seedling, to harvesting and eating. And there’s something deeply comforting and reassuring when you know how to produce food for yourself.

It’s also just a great excuse to spend more time outside, and it gives you a deeper appreciation for all the work that goes into producing the food that we buy and eat every day. But gardening can be a bit intimidating, especially in a small space where you might have limitations on size, sunlight, rules, budget, or even just not knowing how to start.

We’ve been growing food on our urban balcony for the past 3 years and we’ve completely fallen in love with small space gardening. But it has been a steep learning curve and there has been a ton of work, research, and trial and error along the way.

So to give you a head start on your own gardening journey, we’re sharing some of our best tips and advice that we’ve learned so far from our experience, including, things we wish we’d known, how to get started, important things to consider, how to save money as you go, some pros and cons, and more!

2 months ago | [YT] | 97

Exploring Alternatives

Kate has been living full-time on this super charming tiny houseboat since 2020. In this video, she shares a full tour of her home on the water, as well as her experience as a liveaboard in a marina, including some of the challenges, the monthly expenses, the incredible community, the renovations and maintenance, how the systems work, and more!

The house boat is approximately 550-600 square feet, and includes the main level and the loft bedroom. Kate's houseboat is connected to city water and hydro electricity, and she has a septic tank for waste. She also has a high-speed internet connection at the dock which allows her to work from home.

Living on a boat year-round in Canada is not easy because of the harsh winters so to prevent ice from forming around her home, Kate has several bubblers installed around the pontoons that prevent the water from freezing. She also has a heat trace line to prevent her water line from freezing and she heats her home with a mix of the wood stove and electric wall heaters.

3 months ago | [YT] | 140

Exploring Alternatives

This is an epic renovation transformation! A row of 6 derelict emergency exits at the back of an 1880s heritage building were repurposed and renovated into modern tiny houses in the City of Montreal. Each tiny home is 350 square feet and has three floors. The first floor has all of the amenities like a kitchen and dinette, a tiny bathroom, and a combo washer dryer. A curved staircase leads up to the second floor which houses the living room and home office with a sofa, TV, folding desk, and storage space. Another set of stairs leads up to the third floor which is the bedroom and closet area, with a double bed with integrated storage, a dresser, and an open closet.

These tiny homes were designed as long term rentals for students or for anyone looking for a tiny home in the City of Montreal. It's an impressive project that managed to create new homes in underused spaces, and is part of a broader movement towards densification to help provide homes to more people in the city.

3 months ago | [YT] | 116