Age in place / tiny house

Location: Burien, WA

Size: 300 sf

Type: Backyard cottage DADU

Structural Engineer: Julie Smith Lubke

Renderings: Jorge Burke

Builder: Love Construction

Built, 2024

This project is an age in place DADU for a client with minimal possessions and a nomadic lifestyle. Her dear old friend and her decided to split a beautiful gardened lot, and live in proximity to each other in two separate houses.

The design emphasized minimalism in style and content: how to make the most with the least amount, how to make the house seem bigger than 300 sf and how to customize it for the client while keeping it accessible for occasional Airbnb guests. The house is one big room, but each ‘niche’ feels appropriately programmed and ‘a bit like a living room’ or ‘a bit like a bedroom’.’ We designed the house with the outdoors, so as to increase its actual footprint, so just like in a big house, the client could enjoy an outdoor patio, views to the backyard and a front porch.