Chris and I are commercial and fine art photographers who also have a strong passion for architecture and interior design.

We have talked about downsizing into a smaller home for years and finally took the plunge. The tiny house movement that has taken off around the country has been a big source of inspiration for both of us. We live in the San Francisco Bay area, one of the most expensive areas of the country, so this made a lot of sense for us. We have always valued great design over a large amount of space so we opted to have a small house that we could design the way we wanted rather than a big house that was not our style or too big to affordably renovate.

We gutted the cottage we now live in down the studs and spent about 9 months in the renovation process. The budget for the project more than doubled in that short time, mostly because we used all eco-friendly materials which drove up the costs, but we felt it was worth it. Pinterest was an invaluable tool in this process for deciding on the design and fixtures for the house.

We were inspired by Danish Modern Design, as well as the farmhouse look that is common in the Sonoma area where we chose to move. We are very inspired by minimalism both in our fine art work as well as interior design.

With all the technology and busyness in our lives, we like to live in an all white space with artwork that is calming, minimal, and monochromatic that somehow connects us back to the natural world. That is the type of artwork we love to create and surround ourselves with inside our home.

Because we went so far over our original budget and drained our savings to create our space, we needed a low cost option for the artwork. We chose to print on watercolor paper and use low cost wood dowels from urban outfitters to create a tactile simple display. For the hallway, we made optimal use of the space with a large canvas print. We are really happy with how it turned out!