Shipping Container Homes & Buildings: 1000 sqft Shipping Container Home, Seattle, Washington

The exterior retains its shipping container industrial look; exterior doors open to reveal classic French doors

Location

Containers	6x20ft
Area	1000 sqft
Bedrooms	1
Year	2017
Location	Delridge, Seattle, Washington
Photography	Alex Crook

Description by seattlemag

When Julianna Carlson left her parents’ Delridge home for college in Santa Barbara, she never expected to tire of the eternal California sunshine. But the longtime Pacific Northwesterner couldn’t stay away—she graduated in 2015 and returned. She’s now settled on a plot of land she purchased just down the street from the house she grew up in.

Although the neighborhood is familiar, her home is completely novel. Disappointed by homes available in her price range, Carlson decided to do something different: The political science major, with no architectural experience, sketched out her own home made from used shipping containers.

Carlson purchased six 20-foot shipping containers from DryBox, a Chehalis company that provides shipping containers with custom modifications. The containers were trucked in and stacked in two days during the spring of 2017. Window holes were pre-cut based on Carlson’s specs, but the interior build-out—drywall for exterior-facing walls, plumbing, installing electrical—took almost a year, largely because obtaining proper permits wasn’t an easy process, she says. The city didn’t really know how to handle a container home.

On their exteriors, Carlson intentionally left the shipping containers—four on bottom, two stacked on top—largely untouched. But inside, she went with a cozy nautical theme: The handrail to the master bedroom upstairs is reminiscent of those on a ferry; tiny painted cargo boats are stenciled onto an accent wall downstairs; and a porthole in the master bedroom’s walk-in closet gives the feeling of being in a ship’s hull.

“I really wanted the interior space to feel bigger than it was,” Carlson says of maximizing her 1,000 square feet. “We’re a boat family—my parents used to commercial fish. I firmly believe that boats have it figured out when it comes to putting as much as possible in a small space.” To do that in her home, she relies largely on portable furniture—like a wheeled slab coffee table she made—that can be pushed aside when she and boyfriend Kris Wilson are entertaining. There’s also a 1,000-square-foot outdoor patio, which doubles the livable space (as weather allows).

Now 25, Carlson likely won’t live here forever. But she says she’s designed her home in a way that will allow for another container to be added to provide more space later. After all, she figures she only spent 70 percent of what it would have cost her to buy a comparable existing home. “I’ve really fallen in love with shipping containers, more than I ever thought possible,” she says.

Description by homecrux

High cost of traditional housing in Seattle piloted Julianna Carlson, a Delridge resident to build a shipping container home as her first home. Despite any previous architectural understanding, she sketched out her own two-story home and achieved the design with six shipping containers.

She used six 20-foot customized shipping containers from Chehalis-based Company DryBox – four in the bottom and two stacked on the top, and it took her about a year to finalize the interior layout.

All the shipping containers are left intact intentionally, which makes it the most unique home in her neighborhood. For interiors, she opted for a coastal chic theme. French doors lead inside the home with white walls and ceiling contrasting the wood style flooring. The nautical interior theme is broadened with the ferry-like handrail to the master bedroom upstairs.

The living area has a sofa and a tree stump coffee table that can be rolled in when needed. The kitchen has concrete countertops, a large sink, storage cabinets, and other required appliances. Upstairs is the master bedroom with a porthole window that gives a feeling of being in a ship’s hull. There’s a bathroom with shower and toilet on the first floor. In addition, a 1,000-square-foot patio is included on the upper level.

Carlson cleverly designed the shipping home so that additional modules can be added in need of more living space later. She sees her two-story shipping container home as an affordable housing solution, which she completed by spending about 70-percent of what it would have cost her to buy a comparable traditional home.