Interesting Documentary: Tiny

Last night I finally watched the documentary Tiny: A Story About Living Small on Netflix. The film follows Christopher Smith (and his girlfriend Merete Mueller) as he builds his own tiny house with no building experience, a tight budget, and a short amount of time. Most of the tiny houses featured in the film were under 200 square feet and as a result of building code restrictions, were built on trailer beds.

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I hadn't heard of the tiny house movement before watching the film and I thought it was interesting to hear all of the different reasonings behind living small. Some people just wanted to minimize their lifestyle, others set out to save money, some (like Christopher) wanted a way to live off the land with less impact on their natural surroundings. The tiny house movement seems like a great way to promote sustainability and help change the value we place on space.

Smith and others in the tiny house movement were inspired by Henry David Thoreau and the ideas he writes about in Walden. After reading the book earlier this year, I also felt inspired to lead a more purposeful life. Even though I struggle with the concept on a daily basis, I'm trying to be a more conscious consumer. Right now it's all about the little changes you can make.

I love the idea of building your own house, no matter what size, and having the ability to say "hey, I made that." Watching Smith build his tiny house with little experience showed that anyone with enough passion and hard work could create their own home. It's like creating a large work of art with a very deliberate purpose. Making something useful out of recycled and mostly natural resources is an ultimate goal of mine. Having a space that reflects me and accomplishing that with my own hands, would really help solidify the feeling of home.

I absolutely love the use of metal siding on this design from Tumbleweed.

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Living small would have it's challenges. Some of the people interviewed for the film lived in tiny houses as a couple, which seems like the worst idea ever to me. But living in a tiny house would also have some major advantages as a single, twenty something. I don't think I could live in a tiny house for the rest of my life, but it's still be awesome to try for a while. Even if you don't find the idea of living in a tiny house appealing, I do think it's important to try and live smaller lives. The film really focuses on changing the way people judge other's by what, or how much, they own. 

I want to live a deliberate life, and maybe that doesn't mean "going off the grid" and living in a tiny house in the woods, but finding purpose in the space I occupy. It means consciously deciding to have a smaller impact on this earth and a larger impact on the people around me.

-S