Shipping Container

Adorable in style, this house is full of small-space lessons anyone could use for a size-challenged home, from a DIY Murphy bed (using hardware found on Amazon), to sliding doors, and even the use of color in a compact space.

Kicker and Anne Kalozdi designed and built this house made out of shipping containers... despite having no real experience building a house before!

Name: Chris and Noel Clayton, their kids, and lots of pets Location: Adrian, Missouri Size: 3,200 square feet Years lived in: 4 years, owned Chris and Noel’s home seems like an episode out of HGTV’s “You Live in What?” The entire house—including the grain bins, but also much of the building material and fixtures—was sourced from secondhand places like estate sales, auctions, and yep, even dumpsters.

Name: Jasmine Waheed and cat Barney Location: Garment District — Montreal Size: 1,500 square feet Years lived in: 2 years, 8 months, owned After traveling across—and falling in love with—Canada, Jasmine Waheed decided to move from London to Montreal 15 years ago. Her background is in graphic design, but upon arriving in Montreal, she decided to make the switch to photography.

Name: Seth Rodewald-Bates & Elisabeth Davies Location: Carrollton — New Orleans, Louisiana Size: 750 square feet Years lived in: 1.5 years; Owned Tucked into a long, narrow lot in the Carrollton neighborhood of New Orleans, not far from where the mighty Mississippi bends, is a sight you don’t expect to see among the shotguns, cottages, and bungalows: two giant steel boxes primed in Rust-Oleum orange-brown and stenciled with white numbers once used to identify cargo.