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This is a 28′ metal framed tiny house on wheels by Mint Tiny Homes.
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28′ Tiny House on Wheels by Mint Tiny Homes (Metal Framed)
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Alex
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Why do all these THOW builders have a problem with installing an outside banister on the stairs???
Its not that hard…
I would suspect it looks cool – or, because of visual design interference primarily, but also involves the fact nothing is so far you can’t reach out and stop yourself if you start to topple. The open-ish space in the middle of this design would be horrifically impinged by an outside railing on the stairs. That is to say, the viability of this particular design depends on the stairs not having such a railing.
“involves the fact nothing is so far you can’t reach out and stop yourself if you start to topple…”
Tell that the to groggy person getting up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and walks off the middle of the stairs forgetting there is a turn…
Seriously ALL of these THOWs without stair railing is a stupid accident waiting to happen- especially for builders in our (US) litigious society.
Mark, actually it depends… There’s more than one way to design safety features and not all safety features are necessarily good for all design layouts.
Mind, in a Tiny House you’re going to typically have to deal with stairs that are only two feet wide or less… Enclosing that space and adding hand rails can make navigating the stairs harder, especially if you have to contort to make your way through and that can make it more likely you’ll lose your balance.
Even if you leave the outer side open and only put a rail on the inside, against the wall, it can mean you’ll be leaning over the edge of the stairs as you navigate them and that too can lead to losing your balance.
Properly implemented, they can help add a layer of protection but just a layer… There’s no guarantee that you will always be able to grab it and stop yourself from falling or that it won’t ever cause you to lose your balance because it got in the way or you had to grab it at a odd angle…
Some Tiny House stairs can also be pretty steep, so may be better to put in hand holds on the stairs itself as you’ll be using it almost like a ladder anyway… Or the stairs may have a design that would make it easier to just use a hand grip at a mid-point, which you would be grabbing anyway because of the shape of the stairs and the way you get in and out of the loft would have you grabbing it as a point of leverage…
Besides, it’s not like you could never just add things like rails and it would be cheaper to DIY than have the builder always do it… In addition to possibly make it easier to move into the house by not having things in the way until after you are all moved in… Such as being able to get a mattress into the loft is easier if there’s nothing really blocking you from simply pushing a mattress into the loft, for one example where some things a better installed afterward…
While stairs are one of those things people like to be creative with and there are other ways to build in safety features that may fit the owner better… Assuming they even need stairs in their design…
That said, I otherwise agree that this isn’t a good design…
At the very least they should have put a vertical bar right at the corner of the turning point in the stairs to provide something to grab onto to guide someone around that corner… Hopefully, the owner will think of it or place something that will block off that corner, like a tall closet maybe…
Placing the stairs on the lower side of the roof pitch also makes transitioning into and out of the loft more difficult and there’s no double step to provide a transition point for the loft to more easily switch between standing and crawling/sliding…
There is a hand rail by the loft on the wall but it only helps getting into and out of the loft…
I’m with Mark, here. When I looked at it, the first thing my mind said was, “Need to install a fall-break wall so you don’t go off the stairs in the middle of the night.” I’ve seen some fall-break walls that are very nice in design. The one I’d use here is a frame with equally paced out blank space with stud. This way you get the wall, but it’s not so solid looking as to disrupt the design aspects of thing. I saw this in a Japanese tiny house where a solid wall would have been too much, so the designer used framed in studs alternating with open spaces; very effective. I think safety trumps design in cases like this. But, on the other hand, a fall-break wall can always be added in if the customer wants this feature.
I agree about the handrail. It’s crazy not having a handrail. Having had a “freak” fall a couple of months ago requiring 17 staples in my head I can’t imagine risking injury because of aesthetics! Also adding a slide in the living area would make these homes so much more liveable. That can’t be hard or expensive to do! Everyone keeps asking for them why aren’t builders listening? This is a nice home but nothing unique.
Now, this is a THOW I can appreciate! I am so sick of layouts with the bath immediately adjacent to the kitchen. Even though the size of these houses precludes any great separation between the two, and it is (probably)
more efficient and less costly to keep the plumbing all together, I personally find the idea of sharing germs and odors between these two rooms very off putting.
Odors I can understand but germs… Nope, the typical kitchen will have 100 to 200 times the germs that your bathroom will have, and of the more dangerous kinds.
There is also the fact that most of the germs in the bathroom come directly from the people who use it and thus they’re not really isolating those germs to the bathroom anyway.
We are all covered inside and out with micro organisms, in fact we have 10x more bacteria in our guts and on our bodies than we do actual cells.
This is called our microbiome and while we share 99% of our DNA, there’s about only 50% commonality with our microbiome, but people who live together develop much more similar microbiomes…
Basically we have 2-5 pounds of bacteria on us and in us at any given moment. Because it’s bacteria, living and changing, it causes changes in us.
We’re constantly exchanging germs and microbes with other people in our environment. Everyone and everything we come into contact with is potentially changing who we are.
While micro organisms not only help us digest and process certain foods but also effect our immune system, as well as fight off mental disorders like depression. They have even been linked to both causing and helping anxiety and autism.
So micro organisms are part of us and our life and we actually need many of them to be healthy. Over sterilizing of our environment has led to anti-bacteria resistant strains that can kill people and a general reduction in the average persons immunity and increased sensitivity to allergies that are far more common now than ever before.
I’d suggest anyone wanting to learn more look up health sites like WebMD and many others that provide reports, access to advice from trains professionals in the health field, and studies to show what actually good and bad habits to have are and what is really in the average home home…
Sorry, but even with low flow toilets, tests have determined that a toilet plume disperses droplets containing feces anyway from 6ft to 15 ft and may linger for several hours – Nor does flushing with the seat closed get rid of all germs and particles. According to your referenced site, WebMD, germs found in the bathroom can include gastrointestinal viruses such as the Norovirus and “are easily transmitted and can remain on a solid surface for as much as a week”. E. coli, salmonella and other enteric pathogens can also be present.
So, while you may not worry about the proximity of these germs to the kitchen, I personally prefer them to be as far away as possible.
No offense.
No offense taken, but you missed the part about most of those germs and bacteria in the bathroom coming from your body and that you’re taking those germs everywhere you go regardless…
Again, there’s 2-5 pounds of bacteria on us and in us at any given moment.
So there’s no actual separation… and things like norovirus can be spread regardless if a person handling the food is already infected, as it not only spreads by touch but also aerosolized from the infected person, especially if they vomit anywhere nearby… Along with simple sweat, as our pores contain many micro-organisms as well.
Not all bacteria is bad, though, and many of the micro-organisms are found naturally in other things. Take Lactobacillus, cheese, sour cream, and nearly any kind of thickened milk will have lactobacillus in it. It was the bacterium that causes the milk to thicken in the first place.
Lactobacillus’ acidification of its environment kills off, or at least inhibits, other kinds of bacteria. So having it in your fridge is actually a good thing, and can be considered more effective than many anti-bacteria cleansers… The original use of the Lactobacillus was to avoid food poisoning before they learned it had other uses…
Another example is if you have a pet like a dog then it’s bringing in Proteobacteria. About one-third of known bacteria are Proteobacteria. It’s a group that includes everything from the bacterium that causes whooping cough to many of the bacteria responsible for nitrogen fixation, and is therefore responsible for all life on Earth.
People with pets increased their bacterial biodiversity by 50%. The increased biodiversity pets bring, tend to cause people to have fewer allergic and skin reactions than petless people. Some studies show that this extends to babies born to pregnant women who lived with dogs in the house were less prone to asthma.
But the concentration of germs, especially ones that can actually make you sick, are still far higher in the kitchen because they come from multiple sources and they are usually allowed to linger longer and in a way that promotes the bad micro organism rather than the good ones.
Meat, produce, etc. are not touched just by you but everyone through the entire chain from farmers to consumers and are typically host to a wide range of micro-organisms.
Fortunately, most are harmless and many we may actually need to be healthy, like probiotics, but like any ecosystem there’s both good and bad…
Places we eat or handle food promote comparative large colonies of Enterococcus. These are more dangerous bugs. They’re more likely to be resistant to antibiotics and more likely to cause medical problems from urinary tract infections to meningitis.
Places like a keyboard that we touch regularly typically are home to these because we so rarely clean them regularly and those who eat in front of their computers are more likely to produce them…
There’s also a distinction between microbial organisms that may produce things like smells but are otherwise doing something useful like breaking down waste, nature’s recyclers that may be also helping to kill off bad micro-organisms, from ones that are actually dangerous and most of the dangerous ones thrive where we eat or otherwise handle food… Especially, as some of them live naturally in the pores of our skin and what we handle can effect those colonies of micro organisms.
So it’s not about not worrying about about what micro-organism you may be exposing yourself to… It’s realizing where they actually come from and how they propagate, along with what can and can’t make them dangerous that’s important.
Fact is no matter what you do the kitchen will always be a high threat zone and should be treated as such no matter what else may be a factor.
So always use hot water, always clean regularly, do your best to avoid cross contamination from meats and produce, and don’t forget the one variable that is always present is you and your body…
Oh, speaking of flush… It’s one of the reasons why Composting Toilets are actually less yucky than people seem to think… No water=no splashing and the composting process is actually killing off the pathogens and converting the waste into its base organic matter.
Though, not all systems are equal and not all are true composting systems. Much of the negative stereotype comes from the non-composting systems.
But a true composting system is actually much more hygienic than most people assume, especially compared to what they may call “real” toilets.
Ugh. I don’t actively dislike too many tinies, but this one is an exception. To me, it’s just plain ugly, inside and out. The lofts are too short on headroom, too much gloss white, the inside looks like an outside, too much (shudder) dark brown. Sterile and horrible. And I agree about no railing. I would actually build a small windwall at the stairs to break up the space. And make a place for art.
I love the rich dark floor & ceiling! I also love the kitchen! Can’t believe how huge the kitchen sink is! The lofts look like they are a good size!Thank You for sharing!🌻
I agree with everyone who believes an outside bannister and a loft railing is a safety necessity. All of these tiny houses should be required to have them. Design. shemine. Once you break your neck due to whatever reason, the need for them becomes obvious.
Why not have the stairs on the opposite side, allowing more head room?
Does seem like they made some odd design choices… I’m assuming it’s because of the placement of the windows and doors. The kitchen sink is directly opposite the door and it can’t be moved to the opposite side without moving the door…
So that would mean part of the kitchen will extend into the walkway towards the main living space and make it harder to get from the kitchen to the main space.
Given the option, I think most people would still prefer the trade-off in favor of getting more height for the stairs and the easier transition to and from the loft that would provide, but perhaps the owner wanted it this way as some people care more about the spaces they feel they will spend the most time in and are willing to sacrifice the spaces that they will spend the least amount of time in…
Having a clear and open path to the main living space from the entrance, for example, means it’s easier to entertain guests, and there may be things the owner will be installing later that will make use of it…
It’s just hard to see the reasoning the way it is now, but there’s only so much the unfurnished house will tell us without knowing the owner’s intent…