The Outlook

In the spring of 2014 Cameron and U of M Art and Design professor Roland Graf began to think about ways to connect U of M students to the project on Stone School Road. The thinking of CTN leaders had been shifting away from a “tent city” as a solution for the property toward more of a “tiny house village” solution (through conversations with the city it was made pretty clear to CTN that tents on the property were not going to get past city officials, but that a tiny house model might have a chance). Roland and Cameron designed an Experimental Design class that would produce a range of site plans and a range of tiny house concepts in order to give the CTN community a starting point with which to begin to envision what the “tiny village” might look like. Through a process of site visits and interviews with members of CTN each student would develop their own concept for the site and one tiny house. Once this design phase was complete we reflected as a group on the best ideas for the tiny house and through a process of design, distill, and redesign - reached a ready to build design by late October. The final weeks of the semester were a mad dash to fabricate the building and install it in a courtyard outside of Art and Design for further testing over the winter semester. The home will be moved to the Stone School Road property in May where it will serve as a test prototype and demonstrate to the city and community a potential housing solution.