Our Zellige and Terracotta Tile Shine in This Tiny Home Gem
Turning shipping containers into tiny homes, retreats and office spaces is a trend that’s likely here to stay. With a small footprint, the construction and design costs are much lower than a traditional house, and the portability means you can choose the perfect location for your project’s final home.
The creative minds at @thetxcollective have one of our favorite recent projects in the tiny home space. Using our Terracotta and Zellige tile in the kitchen and bathroom, the TX Collective has created a retreat in the Texas wilderness that we’re all clamoring to book for our next weekend getaway.
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Bridging the Gap Between Outside and In
The creativity that goes into making every square inch of a tiny space both functional and beautiful constantly inspires us. With a shipping container, the project also requires elements that can bridge the industrial vibes of the outside with the desired interior ambiance. When you have minimal indoor square footage, it becomes crucial to make the exterior feel like a livable, inviting space as well. The TX Collective designed the Desert Rose Ranch space with this in mind, incorporating large windows, a rooftop patio and plenty of interesting landscaping around the container.
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Making Natural Elements Upscale in the Bathroom
In most rooms, they’ve incorporated lots of natural elements to make the transition from exterior to interior almost seamless. Potted cactus, linens in earth tones and hardware in industrial matte shades blend the desert landscape with the shipping container itself. In the bathroom, the natural elements continue with our Unglazed Natural Terracotta Zellige 2″x6″ tile.
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The floor-to-ceiling vertical tile pattern draws your eye upward, making a small space feel large and luxurious. Our unglazed Zellige tile looks like an upscale extension of the view out the window. We love how well this space shows off the potential of tiling in tiny homes.
Making Traditional Modern in the Kitchen
When you’re putting a very modern structure in the middle of a very wild landscape, it’s a design challenge to blend the two styles. We love that the TX Collective made a purposeful decision to use traditional materials in a modern way to celebrate this space. The tiny home’s kitchen features several traditional-turned-modern elements:
- Brass sconces.
- Open wooden shelving.
- A sliding barn door.
- A rolling garage door that opens to the grand exterior patio.
Our favorite part, though, is their solution to making a kitchen backsplash that feels modern but also blends with the natural elements just two feet away: our Glazed Clay Zellige 4″x4″ tiles!
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Zellige’s handmade quality means that each tile is unique and a bit imperfect. That’s what gives this tiny home tile backsplash its warm, earthy feeling. The tile elevates this small space by adding depth and character functionally and beautifully.
We’re inspired by how well the TX Collective incorporated tiling in this stunning tiny home. Every inch is a blend of modern and natural, inside and outside. Just because the space is small doesn’t mean the options for upscale design are limited. In fact, we’re inspired to find more creative ways to use tile to maximize the function and appeal of even the tiniest spaces (and we might need a trip to this retreat for some hands-on research!).