Aside from working on a custom tree house for a Boston-area client, Derek “Deek” Diedricksen of www.Relaxshacks.com has also been working on completing a ANOTHER BRAND NEW cabin for people to check out at his upcoming hands-on tiny house building and design workshop Nov. 15-17 in MA (you’ll see SEVEN cabins in all, including THE FIRST TUMBLEWEED).
He has also been wrapping up the details on his tiny house on wheels, “The Cub”, that workshop attendees will be seeing, AND on this little cabin in Vermont, that cost a mere $300 to make. There’s a vlog video on the cabin you can check out below, and here are a few as-of-yet released photos on the progress he’s been making in Vermont, where he’s mainly building with recycled materials….part of the focus of his upcoming gathering.
DIY Micro Cabin in the Woods by Derek Diedricksen
I encourage you to see more of this tiny cabin and learn more below:
They built it in Brooklyn, New York inside the old warehouse workshop you can see below. It was a prefab design done by Derek. It took him two days to create the prefab kit and 5 hours to put it together with 3 people. There are all sorts of cool designs inside and out include a pop up window, lantern and a voodoo owl.
If you could point to a single structure that ignited the modern tiny house movement, this would be a strong contender. Jay Shafer’s original Tumbleweed tiny house — built between 1997 and 1999 — was a radical experiment: could a person live comfortably and with dignity in just 89 square feet?
The answer, as Shafer proved by living in the house himself, was yes. That proof of concept didn’t just change his life. It launched a company (Tumbleweed Tiny House Company), inspired a generation of builders, and helped create the cultural framework we now call the tiny house movement.
In this video tour, Derek “Deek” Diedricksen — author of Humble Homes, Simple Shacks, host of HGTV’s Tiny Yellow House, and one of the tiny house community’s most recognizable voices — walks through the original Tumbleweed and gives us an inside look at where it all began.
Derek “Deek” Diedricksen of RelaxShacks.com has spent his life building tiny structures—from childhood backyard forts to dozens of micro cabins, sleeping huts, and unconventional shelters. Self-described as a “bizzar-chitect,” Deek approaches tiny architecture with creativity, resourcefulness, and a healthy skepticism of conventional housing norms.
Origins of a Micro Builder
Deek’s passion for small structures started early. At 14, he discovered Lester Walker’s book Tiny Houses, which showed him that others shared his fascination with compact dwellings. That realization launched a lifelong pursuit of designing and building micro architecture.
His backyard has become a showcase of micro cabins, shelters, and shacks—each completely unique, most built from salvaged materials.
Derek “Deek” Diedricksen of RelaxShacks built the UB-30 treehouse cabin in the Vermont woods as a birthday gift for his brother. The two-sleeper micro fort features a see-through roof that creates spaciousness while connecting occupants to the forest canopy above. Built inexpensively using salvaged materials including recycled windows, the cabin overlooks a stream from its elevated perch.
In this episode of Tiny Yellow House, Derek Diedricksen and his brother explore a lake in Maine while scouting potential tiny island properties. The video captures the adventure of searching for small, affordable land parcels that could support a minimal cabin or retreat.
