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Digging Deeper Studio Design +Build

A story of Design & Built Based on Upcycling 2015

By High Altitude Finishes

April 20^th, 2018

We decided to convert an old unused garage into a tiny home. The total sq ft floor plan is 240 sq ft. Given our budget constraints, we collected used materials for about 5 years prior to starting the project. The finished product is below.

We also re-purposed a natural gas burning heating stove to work on propane gas. Someone sold us a $3,000 stove for $700 because the stove had some missing parts. We researched the stove model, bought additional parts and made the stove a functional heating unit. We then took old fencing and created our interior walls.

The Construction Process

Every story really begins with cleaning someone else's trash. Yes, it is the most important part of every project, yet, no one talks about it.

In order to begin our project, we had to level the existing ground floor, install a radon system, design our plumbing system & remove some pre-existing garage doors.

Then we tested different mixtures of adobe mix, straw and sand until we found an adequate floor material consistency.

On the day of pouring the floor, the temperatures were below 32F. We don't recommend building above 9,250 ft of elevation in the winter months.... We froze our hands for the 16 hours that it took to build the floor.

The result was actually a beautiful floor that really does the job of capturing passive solar heat.

In order to achieve the desired lighting look, we installed a 10ft by 7 ft sq ft recycled window. We also installed a recycled French Door.

We then took cabinets that our client had no need for and integrated them into a fully functional small kitchen. We found an old $20 concrete countertop at a salvage yard. We had to customize the bottom cabinet to fit the countertop. We then took some left over glass tile to create the kitchen splash.

For the bathroom walls, we took old metal roofing from an old industrial building that our company was commissioned to take down.

Finished Product

Over the last eight years we have had an aerospace engineer, a photographer and a psychologist live in the space. We have created great friendships in the process of providing an affordable place to live in Boulder County.