The 18’6″ x 6′ Escargot is a pedal-powered boat designed by Phil Thiel. I absolutely love the idea of this small, easy-to-build shanty boat as a house.

The minimalist design is beautifully simple. Functionally somewhere between a motor-driven cruiser boat and a kayak or canoe — it’s perfect for eco-tourism rentals and slow houseboaters alike.

The boat is aptly named due to the fact that it only goes 3-4 miles per hour at a pedaling rate of 50rpm.

91-year-old naval architect Phil Thiel, born in Brooklyn, now in Seattle has created human-powered boats since his teenage years. According to Wooden Boat magazine, he has only driven a car twice in his lifetime. He sells fully detailed plans for $150 by mail.

Photo credit: gruene-flotte.de

Photo from Stephen Simonetto

This tiny island was featured on my blog last year when nobody was living there, but now I have photos from the current resident, Katherine Ball.

Her six-week residency entitled “No Swimming” runs from August 12th until September 25th and Katherine is blogging from her iPad along the way.

It is definitely a spartan existence living in a 20 foot diameter fiberglass and foam igloo. “I’m using a lot of resources from the museum, keeping food in the visitor center. I could cook out here but then I have to wash my dishes. I could create a miniature grey water system,” said Ball when she first moved in.

photo from inspir3d.net

Built by artist Andrea Zittel, the intention is for a different artist to live here every summer and modify the island however they like.

They call it Indianapolis Island or “Indy Land” and it lives on the grounds of the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

Katherine is implementing the use of mushrooms (mycobooms) to filter toxins out of the lake water. “It’s strange that people I talk to all over the country are resigned to the fact that our waterways are polluted. I would love to help people feel like ‘our waterways are polluted, we need to try to fix this’ instead of simply accepting that pollution is normal.”

Read her blog for more information on this biologically-oriented pollution solution.  Photos by Michelle Pemberton / The Star. Thanks to Deryck for the head’s up.

An email arrived reminding me that tomorrow is the last day the Vardo plans will be on sale from Tumbleweed Tiny House Company. This got me daydreaming about building a DIY truck camper on top of my friend’s old Toyota pickup truck.

By far the smallest design offered by the company, this vardo incorporates a full-size bed and 35 cubic feet of storage below. I’m not sure about the practicality of this on the road, but it is certainly one of the cutest handmade campers I’ve seen in person. This creation lived next to Jay’s house as a teeny tiny guest house in Sebastopol when I was there.

Elegant, simple, and most certainly green. This project still has a few kinks to work out — like how to keep from getting busted for parking on the sidewalk — but it’s beautiful nonetheless. Built by 24-year old Dai Haifei, an architecture graduate who couldn’t afford rent in Beijing.

Image Credit: AFP / Getty Images

For two months he lived on the street next to his workplace in his solar-powered “egg house.” It has a bed, a nightstand, a small sink, and an electric blanket to keep warm.

“I feel good living here though it’s simple, and a bit cold sometimes, what important for me, is – it saves me a lot of money!” Dai told a reporter. He said that his parents were old, and they would have to work for two or three hundred more years in order to afford a house in Beijing. Without paying rent, he can sometimes go for a coffee and enjoy the “petty bourgeoisie life.” (via)

Dai documented the building project quite well on his flickr page but I will share a few more photos here. The frame is bamboo with sacks of grass seed attached to the outside. The water tank held about 3 days worth of water, and he would refill from his workplace.

In total he spent about three months building it with $964. He was “evicted” in mid-December and is reportedly living with friends.

Photo credit: Beijing Times

Jay and Steve at Tumbleweed Tiny House Company have generously invited us to join the Tiny House Workshops Feb 5 & 6 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. I’m stoked not only because it will be my first time in Santa Fe, but also because it will be the beginning of our two-year traveling adventure! The first part of which will be touring the Western US while towing our tiny trailer, weighing just 1120 pounds.

Yes, I had mentioned it previously, but if you’re new to this blog you may have missed it. We’re embarking on a dream — to be full-time travelers — and I can’t wait. Thank you for following along and I hope to share much more as we go.

It’s a bike-powered Mini Cooper spotted at the Beijing Olympics. Check out the dragon flair. Via Coolhunter.

More floating art! The Waterpod project is about self-sufficient living on a 30×100 foot barge. They were using bike power, raising chickens, harvesting rainwater, solar hot water heating, greenhouse gardening, composting, using a windmill, and getting lots of press about it last year. In a New York Times article, John McGarvey describes it as “farm life, minus the livestock — but inside the fishbowl of New York City.” While this is an art project, I’m looking forward to exploring the concept of housing at sea.

Photo credit: Ian Daniel

Kacey Wong built a teeny-tiny (4′x4′) house on top of a raft and paddled it through the ocean in a homemade sailor suit. The Hong Kong artist created this piece — entitled Paddling Home — as a reflection on high-density urban living and the struggles of staying afloat for the Hong Kong & Shenzhen bi-city Biennale of Urbanism/Architecture. He calls the structure his apartment with a 360 degree view, complete with A/C and golfing opportunities on his “private roof garden.” This short film was made by David Attali.

I love Kacey’s tricycle house featured in the 2007 Biennale.

Two weeks ago in Rotterdam: a spontaneous street party erupted called the “Bucky Bar” (named after Buckminster Fuller, of course). Via Dezeen. Also check out a very similar project, Umbrella House.

A schoolbus found in Laxmi Nagar, Delhi, India. (Via Lloyd’s Blog.)

Photo credit: Moonbuggy