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Small Space Architect Transformed His Own ‘Shell’ of a Home With Scraps and ‘Wabi Sabi’ Principles

Mar. 19, 2013 4:12pm Liz Klimas

Tim Seggerman as an architect seems to not only talk the talk in the homes he builds, but walks the walk in his own.

The home of the Brooklyn-based architect was recently featured by Fair Companies, the same website covering much of the tiny house movement and other unique home design features. He explained in the video feature how he got his house for “nothing.” Well, not quite nothing. After a night camping out near city hall, he bought the house for $140,000 at auction — $14,000 was his down payment. But the house itself wasn’t quite complete either.

Architect Tim Seggerman Designed Brooklyn Home With Lots of Wood and Wabi Sabi Ideas

Seggerman’s house when he first purchased it. (Image: YouTube screenshot)

Seggerman said it was “just a shell.” But it’s a shell with barely a roof that he put his then life-savings into and spent the next couple decades transforming it as the need arose.

(Image: YouTube screenshot)

Because he left the auction with not a penny to his name since it all went to the down payment, he said that much of the house in its current state is put together from scraps left over from other jobs he was on as a home builder at the time.

“That’s what you do when you’re building a house on the fly,” he said, pointing out his repurposed mahogany wood table compared to his cheap wood flooring.

(Image: YouTube screenshot)

Throughout the tour, Seggerman showed off furniture and home design elements that he made by hand, mostly from scraps. One of these are two window doors inside the house made from the wood of the barn at his childhood home.

“I don’t like fancy materials at all,” he said. But wood is favored by him. “It’s by far the best material — nothing comes closer.”

(Image: YouTube screenshot)

Several elements about wood, including its imperfections, are why Seggerman prefers it. Fair Companies has more on Seggerman’s design philosophy:

He believes in taking his time to build and that a home is never finished. It’s an idea embraced by the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi: everything is impermanent, unfinished and imperfect. In Seggerman’s home cables and pipes are uncovered and molding has been removed to leave the caulk line visible.

“The idea of being unfinished is very important. Houses are there to be lived in. They’re there to be personal expressions of people. So many architects you’re dealing with fine lines and everything is precise, insanely precise, but you know that in reality, you get out and there are so many things that go on. You can build it perfectly and it might look nice today, but you have to allow for life.”

Watch the house tour:

Seggerman has also been known to made good use of tiny spaces. In 2012, he showcased a 180-square-foot apartment he redid in New York City. He was also featured in Dwell magazine recently for a slightly larger space — 24o square feet — in New York City’s Upper West Side that he was able to make more functional by crafting it like a “jewel box.” Believe it or not, there’s even a washing machine in this tiny space. See the slideshow of pictures here.

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Related:

(H/T: Gizmodo)

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Comments (21)

2Write4
Posted on March 20, 2013 at 2:24pm
Indoctrination so that people will accept being packed and stacked into the small but tall cities coming in Agenda 21.

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YesLiberalsAreThatDumb
Posted on March 20, 2013 at 12:25pm
Wow. He said he bought that dump “for nothing?” $140,000 is nothing??

I wonder what he’d pay for a used Yugo!

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Marsh626
Posted on March 20, 2013 at 6:22am
The Blaze really has a hard on for the communists at “fair companies” and that dude who makes slingshots…

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aogiss
Posted on March 20, 2013 at 12:13am
He didn’t build that.

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NoMoMrNiceGuy
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 7:42pm
The dude is stoned – I mean super stoned -

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tonyloaf
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 6:20pm
What’s amazing is that dump sold for $140,000. Is Brooklyn that desirable? I am also interested in knowing where he got the balance of the purchase price of $126,000 to pay the city. Given the condition of the house I doubt any bank would have loaned him the money.

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media-bias-steals-elections
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 5:35pm
I used to love stories like this, until I realized that Democrats on city council typically use such “home improvement” opportunities to raise property taxes? So your house looks better, but you can’t sleep at night because the mortgage shot up 20% over night? Then they wonder why no one wants to live downtown, except for penniless people in their twenties who like to drink all night? Don’t you love organizing communities like President Obama?

Look, its a bird, no, its a plane, no, its, its, its a Democrat! Run – invasion! OMG, here come the drones, run for your lives, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Oh, my bad, there’s no where to run to, you just got to deal with it? Go with the flow, don’t make waves, how dare you be political, do you think you have the right to assemble your opinion against Mayor Bloomberg? Be all you can be, not what Mayor Bloomberg thinks you should be?

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- Comeandtakeit
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 6:14pm
  He lost me at “a truck full of Opium”. But I agree, I live in New York, and local taxes prohibit you from really putting money into your house and making it look nice. You are penalized if you conscientious about your homes appearance. Its totally ass backwards.
  
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- thegreatcarnac
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 10:16pm
  Democrats are a scourge. They are the party of the leftist, the lazy, the criminal, and the pervert. What a POS bunch of people?
  
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SaturdaysWarrior76
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:38pm
That’s what I call taking a leap of faith. Nicely done!

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- positive1
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 5:27pm
  At the 2:50 mark he says “I want to get a truck load of Opium and watch movies” Can you say heroin Addict!
  
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YourVoiceMatters
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:32pm
always make room for your library!…every great home no matter the size has a library!

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- YourVoiceMatters
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:48pm
  his home looks like a great place to explore…you can tell he enjoys the journey his home has taken him in his life…and i am sure he is not done yet!
  
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sligresda
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:27pm
between craigslist, estate sales, garage sales and flea markets i cant think of anything that needs to be purchased brand new…….ok undies and shoes, but not much else.

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- Gorp
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:39pm
  Toilet Paper?
  
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- curmudgeon60
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 5:09pm
  Did it say he “PURCHASED the scraps? Our contractor took our scraps to other jobs…..we called it STEALING! A real weasel. He now is in local government. Wonder how much he steals from our taxpayers.
  (nice house though, perhaps built on some others dimes.)
  
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- Stone Cold Truth
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 5:22pm
  I agree with you, but oddly enough underwear have always been a big seller at my yardsales. The first time I laughed at my friend who told me to bring my old underwear, but then I noticed that they all sold. All of them. It happens almost every year now. Go figure. lol
  
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forthepeople
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:25pm
Bravo !

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wilbstal
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:23pm
This house needs firing ports through windows and walls to kill attackers from the local and federal Goverments. And Local crooks of every day nature. Thye will be along as Obama gets more Communist

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- MittensKittens
  Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:40pm
  better watch what you type, cause they’re watchin too (QQ)
  
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SocialistSlayer
Posted on March 19, 2013 at 4:19pm
Yuck !

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