My name is Travis Skinner and this is my house, The Leaf Spring. This started out
actually with a 1984 Terry Taurus camper. I talked to a friend and told him that I
was thinking about building a tiny house and that if he came across a trailer
to let me know. Three months later he called because his neighbor had eight
trailers that were all water damaged and destroyed so I went up to his place
picked up this trailer for free and I demoed the house and salvaged what I
could and then it kind of just was one step after another, you know. I didn't
think too much too far in advance. I just tried to stay focused on what the step
was I was on. Kind of one thing unique I did when framing, which I wouldn't
necessarily recommend, but had a lot to do with my process, was to not have
anything figured out. I had no design. I just put the walls up and then I put a
table inside the walls and I sat there had tea and thought about where I wanted
windows. Then when I was like, "I want a window here", I got out a saw and cut a
window so it was kind of you know one thing after the next just keep on
keeping on.
It kind of took the name The Leaf Spring because the leaf springs on the trailer
acted as the connection between the axle and the frame. It was kind of what gave
the tiny house its jurisdiction is the connection between a steel frame and
some wheels.
One of the important exterior details is I used a rain screen siding which
means that there's a furring strip and it's on each stud member and it holds
the siding out. There's a mesh net at the bottom and then holes at the top. Through
convection heat pools in the bottom and circulates and pulls it out. In the
northwest the best thing to do isn't to just try to keep water out but to design
for when it gets in how do you allow airflow to hit it to dry it out? You know
in any house doors are one of my favorite parts, you know it's the portal. It's the
entranceway and so I wanted to build some cool doors.
Other element was my
back door which is kind of a window. It's an awning style window. I definitely got a
lot ideas about that window from Abel and seeing Abel's work. I actually made
that window in a shop I think, the majority of it.
All right, well here's the kitchen. I did forge work on the brackets and you can see there's a sun here so I
forged the pieces, welded them together, all the brackets are handmade. I made a
simple gravity-fed water system
and then I made this pot rack to keep my dishes overhead and out of the way.
I got back from Sun Ray's when I was building this crazy cedar dome and there
was all this leftover wood and I would just, at the end of the day I'd like
grab three nice looking boards and toss them in my van and be like, "sweet", ya know?
When I got home I had a couple boards and I was like, "I wanna build my cabinet
out of these free dome boards." I had seen this latch. I
loved it because there was no handles on the door and I was like, "that is so
ingenious", and he made it. There's this little horseshoe piece of wood and you
open it just by pushing on it.
The living room features this bench. It's kind of a
cool design element and I took these one by cedar boards and I ripped them with a
jigsaw on the line of the grain. I wanted to build a space where I could have a
desk and a seating area, but then I could also feed a couple people if we needed a
dining room table. The runners for the table on the wall they slide out and then the
leaf is on hinges. This is the not super usable chalkboard. And then the table just
slides together. I forged these snake hinges that fold the leaf down and then
now in this space you can feed six people around the table. And then I guess
the loft, the last component is my bed. I designed it like a futon mattress.
There was all these strips of wood that had air flow between them. Moisture is
just the constant issue in the Northwest and if your mattress if it sits on
a flat surface with no air flow then it will sweat, create an environment for
mold to grow, you're gonna have mold underneath your mattress, very common. I built two
ladders just step above the heater on this black locust board and then you can
crab forged handles and then just walk right up. I had my mom just come and
stay. She's 60 years old and can do it, but yeah you just climb up like that and
then you can just hop back here. You got my bed and then the way I really like to
climb up and down is this monkey bar staircase and it's just fun, you know?
Everyday waking up I really like swinging down, just being a kid. The other
element of the loft is the window that we saw from the outside that awning style
window I was talking about. I really like it a lot because it gets hot up in
the loft so the door's designed so if when I'm hot I can just lean over and
kick the bottom of the door and get airflow. Just kick the top of the door and slide
it back down and I put a little handle that you can grand and pull.
I have a dog. His name is Payal. He's my buddy and he encourages me every day to wake up and get outside.
That's what we do when we wake up. Okay, leave it.
So each morning we walk a pathway down to the creek, kind
of just get acclimated into the world. I'm not inside a box but what's actually
happening. Every day when I get back from my walk I feel like a thousand times
better. My mind's been cleared. I'm not thinking at all about what I was
thinking about and I'm just experiencing what's going on today.
The act of being inspired, inspired to design with intention, create and then
experience. That process the artistic experience once you start stepping into
that realm you start seeing that you can put intention in your design in almost
any medium. The Leaf Spring was the first time where I can put my intention into
something that was mine. Seems like that's a big obstacle for a lot of
creative people is that they don't want to invest into something they don't own
because then they're doing the work and not receiving the eventual reward for it.
The act of learning is directly affected by one's lifestyle
therefore lifestyle becomes a part of the practice. When your lifestyle is
encompassed in practice there's these philosophical questions that develop and
one must establish their own morals and ethical ideals. Those ideals lead one to
seek for fulfillment in their actions. You have to ask what is fulfilling to
you. As you create and then learn from that creation then you experience and
decide whether that creation is fulfilling and then you move on to
continue to do it if it is fulfilling because it's, for you, it's your own
reason. You don't have to answer to anyone. You create for that fulfillment
because it's the right thing. It becomes natural. The design has intention. That
design leads to creation. The creation is then experienced. When you find a flow
you bring all three of these elements together so you're simultaneously
designing, creating, and experiencing. Process evolves and then is influenced
by every other human in their processes. As you develop your own process then
you meet other people that kind of steer you in little directions of the path and
they allow the path to be opened up and that's why I'm here talking to you is
because you have to experience other people's processes in order to develop
your own so the more that we are then exposed to the artistic experience the
more that we can find and seek that in ourselves.
Thanks for watching. I uploaded the full 25 minute tour where Travis goes a lot
more in-depth on the details and design of his house over on the Patreon page. If
you're interested in seeing that extra content or just want to become part of the
team hop over to the Patreon page. Thanks
again I will see you next week! Ciao..