Hut on Sleds, a 35 sq metre home designed by Crosson Clarke Carnachan in Whangapoua, New Zealand

‘Small buildings often give architects a degree of freedom that cannot be obtained in huge public or corporate projects’

When it comes to size we should design and build “as far as you can see,” says Arata Isozaki, and to “the height of the sky”. The 82-year-old Japanese architect, whose work includes museums and sporting arenas, is not suggesting we cover the planet with gargantuan buildings. On the contrary, these are his musings on some of his smallest works – three outdoor concrete “bedrooms” in California’s Mojave desert, each measuring just nine sq metres. They have “the desert as a floor, the sky as a ceiling, and no walls but unframed landscape,” he says.

The quote comes from Small Architecture Now!, a new book published by Taschen. In architecture today, small is big, although the trend is one born out of necessity. “When the money disappears more small structures are created,” posits the author, Philip Jodidio. A bonus is that “small buildings often provide architects a degree of freedom that cannot be obtained in gigantic public or corporate projects”.

Take, for example, Hut on Sleds, a cuboid wooden holiday home on a beach in New Zealand. It measures just 35 sq metres – it could fit on a tennis court seven times over with room to spare – yet sleeps a family of five. As the “hut” is in a coastal erosion zone it had to be designed as a temporary structure: it can be slid off the beach, placed on a barge and relocated (though not quite so easily as it appears in the book. “The farmer’s tractor was the only one we could find on the day we were taking photos, it really needs a much bigger one to move it,” says architect Ken Crosson, of Auckland-based Crosson Clarke Carnachan Architects). Although the rainwater-harvesting, toilet-composting, fully demountable cabin has a small environmental footprint, it is not a lightweight hut; in fact, its wooden frontage folds away to reveal double-height, steel-framed windows that open up to a vista of the sea. “It is life-enhancing . . . with a direct and dramatic connection to the ocean beyond, while the living area flows easily on to the beach,” says Crosson.

With its eye-catching and environmentally sound design, it is no surprise that “Hut on Sleds” won a 2014 Architizer A+ award in the Living Small category. The client’s “modest budget meant a modest size,” says Crosson. “We love a challenge. It was a case of ‘if we don’t need the space, we won’t build it’ – like a caravan or boat, with a place for everything and everything in its place.”...Continue Reading

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