3 x 20ft Shipping Containers Turn Into Amazing Compact Home Living Big In A Tiny House

When you look at a shipping container, the last thing that you think of is a house. But it never ceases to amaze me how people can take these cold metal boxes and turn them into wonderful welcoming homes. Today we're in Victoria where one young couple has taken three of these 20-foot shipping containers and turned them into a remarkably designed home. Hello Amy. Hi Bryce, nice to meet you. Lovely to meet you. G'day Rich, how's it going? Good. This house, it's super super cool. This is actually three 20-foot shipping containers all attached together isn't it? That's correct. Yeah. How did this all actually come about? We didn't need a big home and I guess the shipping containers are already available to us so we had use of them. So we kind of built to our needs. And also we wanted to keep a low debt level so we can continue the lifestyle that we like which is lots of holidays and going overseas with Rich being English and having family over there. So it's another reason why we thought that a smaller dwelling would fit our lifestyle. We came to be living in this home about two years ago after traveling to Europe for your cousin's wedding. We really re-evaluated what was needed in a home and also what the essential tick boxes in life were. So when we decided to go down the home building journey we decided to go down the untraditional route. The design that you've come up with here is really cool. Can you tell me about how you actually laid them all out like this? We wanted something that created a little bit of separation between the kitchen, dining, the study, the living and then our sleeping quarters. So we decided to stagger them to get the best passive solar design as well as a little bit of interest with the links and the staggering of the containers so it looks aesthetically pleasing when you drive up as well. With the three containers and then the adjoining factors together do you know what the total size of this home is? Yes it's around 49.2 square meters. And what about the property we're on right now? How did you come across this? It's my parents property so we are on five acres of it and they're on the other five acres so it's being subdivided. This is a shipping container home and yet looking at it you really wouldn't think so because you've clad everything. Can you tell me a little bit about how you've done all of that? We've used a Calabon product called Designer Panel. It's an interlock cladding, it's fantastic because it's low maintenance and it's very easy to install. So with cladding it you've also gained that sort of space in between which you can add insulation or you've got that air barrier in between the steel of the shipping container and the outside cladding and that's also the same thing with the inside where you've got the inside clad so you can also gain that sort of extra 70 mil of space to insulate so it's like sort of like a sandwich. We really tried to push the boundaries with this project with our insulation to gain a higher star rating because in Australia you require at least a minimum six star. This home's 7.1 so we've got the double glazed timber windows and then the bulk insulation in the ceiling and also under the floor. Looking at the roof this is a really clever design as well because obviously by having the additional roof you're creating a little bit of shade and helping to cool down the space but you've also filled it with solar. Is this house totally off the grid? Not completely off grid due to financial reasons we couldn't afford batteries when we were first installing but that is one of our aims for the future. We do have a feeding tariff so it does offset our usage which is fantastic. Yeah and the advantage of having this huge roof structure across all the containers is we're collecting our own water too so there's a couple large tanks out the back collecting water throughout the year. Excellent what sizes are your tanks? We're collecting around 30,000 litres we initially started off with 20,000 and due to a very dry summer and autumn we decided to put another one in just to safeguard ourselves. So how many watts of solar did you manage to get on the roof here? We went for a 3.75 kilowatt system as there's only two people living in the house at this present time. Well this is such a unique looking home I cannot wait to see how it all works on the inside. Come on in. Yes please thank you. This is stunning. We absolutely love our home. We really enjoy using this space one of the big things was it being healthy for the human the end user as well so it's all zero phenoldehyde joinery that's in place so it's healthy for us to breathe and the finish that we've put on the plywood as well is low VOC so it's healthy for us to use. The style in here is very modern as well isn't it? Absolutely it's something that we went for we just liked to be a bit timeless so you know in 20 years time we hope we're still living here and we you know don't want to be changing things on trend or anything like that we'd rather have a really nice clean line kitchen so we can avoid that. And tell me about the design of your kitchen. A big thing with our kitchen is we wanted a dishwasher just so if we're ever time poor you could utilize that so we decided to go with a half drawer dishwasher which is nice and compact. We also wanted enough storage for pots and pans we don't use many appliances but there's enough storage for those bits that we do use. I obviously really enjoy my little bits and pieces of ceramics and cookbooks so we made sure that they were always on show in the kitchen design as well. And you've got a really good amount of prep area here as well. Yeah so you maybe think with having containers you're almost restricted with your joinery so it has to go in certain places but we've been quite lucky with how it's positioned so we really haven't lost too much prep space or storage space being a smaller container. And one of the things which is definitely a bit of a luxury for a smaller home is to have a dining table. Yeah room for six. Absolutely we love having friends come over so one of the requirements was at least four and we were lucky enough to thrift our lovely kitchen table locally and there's more than enough room in here to entertain six people over for lunch or dinner. Brilliant. And then over here we come to one of the first of the little joins in the containers. Yeah so this is the first link which houses just the laundry and just a small pantry so we didn't really want to have to make space in a small house for these sort of appliances like a washer so we've really gained that sort of space in these links. And also having the doors on you can have the washing machine and it minimizes the sound so it's fantastic you can have it going and being on your laptop and it's not overly distracting so it's great because you can shut it away and forget what's happening behind there. And then what do we have over here in the next container? This is our lounge and study area. Definitely my favorite part of the house. And I can see why this is so cozy. Absolutely it's so great we have the north and the easterly aspects so we gain some beautiful morning light in summer and then during winter it really floods in so sitting on that couch with the morning cup is divine. But one of my favorite things is cozying up in winter in front of the wood burner. A wood burner like this so quickly just becomes the central feature of every home doesn't it? So we were lucky to get this out of another project so it was a minimal cost for us and it really heats the house really well. In Australia you can have pretty harsh temperature variations can't you? And I've noticed that in this home you're just utilizing fans I don't see any air conditioning. No that was another thing with the star rating we made sure we had enough insulation to make sure it was thermally comfortable during winter so we only needed the wood burner and also during summer where we only require the crossflow ventilation so the natural wind cooling the home and also the use of the electric fans on the ceiling. We have only turned them on four times last summer we are very conscious about closing down the house when warm periods come through so it can be really nice and cool in here if we've shut down the house and there is none of that solar gain during those warm periods. Now tell me about the seating area here as well because it looks like you've built quite a bit of storage in this. Yes a lot of the sort of furniture we put into the house there's no sort of like furniture we bought in as such apart from like the stools so everything is built in storage so it's a full depth drawer for each one so it's functional furniture. We've also got all of our bed linen and towels and everything in the other drawers but one of my favorite drawers is our tiny house wine cellar. I bet you're looking forward to when you're able to use that drawer again. Oh absolutely six weeks and counting. Nice and then over here we have your workspace. Yep so really generous space really functional so we kind of work a little bit from home or like our own projects in the evening and this is the perfect space for it really. I like how you've set it up that you both have your individual working space here too. Absolutely you can obviously see from the decorating above whose is whose and we do really enjoy having our sides of the study area. And then behind me here this is another one of the winks. Absolutely so this is where we have some great hanging solutions as well as more hanging some more bookshelves and vacuum so it's fantastic that we're able to utilize every single aspect of our home. And then what do we have in our last container? We have our bedroom as well as our bathroom. This is cool it's really interesting how high you've raised the bed. A big thing as we've mentioned was the storage and making everything as functional as possible so we decided to pick the bed up off the ground so we could have that storage. And this is a queen size bed? That's correct. So within those dimensions that really does just give you a tremendous amount of volume underneath it to turn into storage. And these drawers are full depth the whole depth of the queen mattress so very generous amount of storage. That's really cool and that is a very neat drawer someone's taught you to fold. Thank you very much So with the bed being this high as well it's got to be a bit of a mission to climb up on how do you do that? We just do it with a lovely handy step ladder here. If there's anything to change about the design of the home I think at this specific moment it would be for have the bed one drawer lower. Yes being 34 weeks pregnant it's getting a little challenging getting up and down on that bed. But in the way of long-term things? No nothing at all. And now onto the bathroom. Oh wow the tile work in here is gorgeous. We've got a very very talented tiler. Being a smaller home we wanted to create the illusion of there being a bigger space so we went for full height tiles and also that wet room effect so we didn't want any closed-in areas and by having the nib walls it creates a little bit of storage and interest and depth to place plants and products and everything on there so we really did think out the bathroom and how it would best be utilized and it actually came out being a lot bigger than we anticipated so it is a very generous bathroom. And you've got a flushing toilet here? Absolutely so this is just into our septic system with the use of rainwater and by having it all the way back to the wall with the system being built into the wall not only creates this really handy nib wall but it also makes for a more spacious area. So how long have you actually been living in the home now? 14 months since we've moved in. And how are you finding actually living in the space? We absolutely love it and as you can probably see we have another one on the way and we are going to utilize these spaces until baby number two comes along so we will do some remodeling and make it work for our lifestyle going forward. One question I've constantly been asked is you know don't you regret not having a nursery to decorate and it's kind of it hasn't even crossed my mind being a small home and not having a nursery to decorate it's going to be fun setting up the little bits and pieces that we do have and they've been well thought out. So when the baby comes along we do have a nice bassinet which we have color matched to our inbuilt furniture in the house and with the laundry how it is it's going to be a great space you know to change nappies we are going to set all that up and utilize the laundry space to make that work for us and again shut it away so it's not staring us in the face. One of the great things with utilizing shipping containers is it is really easy just to add another one on when you need it too. Yeah so even in that end container we've sort of decided if we were going to extend where it would be so even a window is positioned in a place where that's going to make it more easy to do in I love that kind of future-proofing because it just goes to show you've really thought this all through. Yeah definitely it's kind of like the great thing with containers is they're all going to be the same size they're all going to slot together well and it's not going to really be out of place it's not like you're slapping on some out of the blue extension it's going to be quite a uniform sort of growth of the house. This home is beautifully done can you talk to me about the All up for the build it cost us A$145,000. There is quite a bit of joinery obviously involved as well so with a substantial amount of the cost being involved in the joinery aspect that also includes all of our solar all of our design fees and also the septic treatment plant. For all of and the size and the quality of this home that's a great price. Absolutely so one thing we really wanted was a quality home and also something that we're really proud of and that is aesthetically pleasing whenever you walk through the door. The fact that we thought so well about what we're putting into the house and how it's laid out and what joinery is working where it's such a pleasant space to be in. This home for us how we feel walking in at the end of a busy day or if we've been traveling for work or on holidays it's very peaceful not only because of the environment it's set around but we have loved every aspect of this home from the design phase through to finish so it's just a beautiful sanctuary to be in. You have both done such a great job of this home it's awesome to see how well it's working for both of you and I'm sure it's going to be great as your family grows. Thank you so much for sharing your home with me. Thank you for coming. Thank you. Cheers. I am just so impressed with this house each and every aspect of it has just been so well considered from the interior which is very functional right the way to the interesting aesthetics of the exterior. Already as a couple this house has served them very well and there is no doubt in my mind that when the new member arrives this is going to be a beautiful family home.