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With interior dimensions of just 3m high, 1.97m wide and 3.6m long, the Cabanon is most likely the smallest apartment in the world – and certainly the smallest one with a spa. -
Space optimisation means a living room that’s 3m high, but a bedroom that only has 1m of free height. -
Owners and designers Beatriz Ramo and Bernd Upmeyer. -
The apartment is located on the top floor of a 1950s residential building in the centre of Rotterdam, with a 6m2 window overlooking the city. -
Rotterdam Micro Apartment -
Mint-green for the bedroom was not their first choice – but it worked surprisingly well with the coral of the living room. -
For Beatriz and Bernd, the apartment was an experiment in a space that represented their belief in personal growth through voluntary reduction. -
To avoid customised objects, the Cabanon’s four spaces were shaped based on standard products, from the bedroom’s mattress to the depth of the mini-fridge in the kitchen. -
The blue mosaic-tile shower and toilet needed only a free height of 2.13m – just enough for the owners to enter comfortably. Given the Cabanon’s 3-metre height, it still allowed for a bedroom above it with a free height of 1m to sit on the bed. -
The blue mosaic-tile shower and toilet needed only a free height of 2.13m – just enough for the owners to enter comfortably. Given the Cabanon’s 3-metre height, it still allowed for a bedroom above it with a free height of 1m to sit on the bed. -
“To have the infrared sauna and the whirlpool bath was our main aim for the Cabanon, so everything else had to adapt to it,” says Beatriz. “The challenge was how to fit the rest around the spa.” -
“To have the infrared sauna and the whirlpool bath was our main aim for the Cabanon, so everything else had to adapt to it,” says Beatriz. “The challenge was how to fit the rest around the spa.” -
“To have the infrared sauna and the whirlpool bath was our main aim for the Cabanon, so everything else had to adapt to it,” says Beatriz. “The challenge was how to fit the rest around the spa.” -
“To have the infrared sauna and the whirlpool bath was our main aim for the Cabanon, so everything else had to adapt to it,” says Beatriz. “The challenge was how to fit the rest around the spa.”
Located in what was an attic on the top floor of a 1950s residential building, this tiny apartment is not only a masterclass in space optimisation, but also the expression of an anti-consumerist lifestyle.
WORDS Steve Smith PHOTOS Ossip Van Duivenbode
There are all kinds of cleverness going on here. Let’s start with the obvious one: the size. Called the Cabanon in deference to Cabanon de Le Corbusier, which the Modernist master built in 1951, this is most likely the smallest apartment in the world. Within the confines of its 6.89m2, its designers have magicked four rooms of ingeniously different volumes and materials. There’s a 3m-high living room with a kitchen, a 1.14m-high bedroom with plenty of storage, a toilet with a rain showerhead, and a spa with an infrared sauna and a whirlpool bath.
The clever folks behind this are STAR Strategies + Architecture, a firm based in Rotterdam in the Netherlands, founded in 2006 by Spanish architect and urbanist Beatriz Ramo. And Beatriz and her partner in work and life Bernd Upmeyer, founder of BOARD (Bureau of Architecture, Research, and Design), didn’t just design the Cabanon – they are also the owners and it’s their second home”.
So what inspired them to create such a small living space? “When we started designing the Cabanon, we never intended to make the smallest apartment in the world,” says Beatriz. “What we wanted for ourselves was a mini spa area – but we also needed a guest room for our family when they visited us. As architects, we like to optimise every project, big or small. It is about ensuring you get the maximum possibilities within your given area, budget or programme. In the Cabanon, optimisation was a key issue.”
Beyond the professional desire to optimise the space, Beatriz and Bernd were driven by a growing personal philosophy. “While designing the Cabanon, I started having an urge to simplify our apartment, to reorganise it and to get rid of stuff,” says Beatriz. “This is an ongoing process; a new approach to everyday life. I think twice before buying anything, or adding a new object to the house or to my wardrobe. The pleasure I once got from buying something, I now derive from getting rid of something I don’t need.”
Another slice of cleverness is that the four spaces in the Cabanon have been shaped based on standard products: the bedroom was designed with a specific mattress in mind; the spa according to the bathtub length; the kitchen based on the mini-fridge depth. This negated the need for customised objects, flipping the notion on its head and designing a space that adapts to more affordable products.
Not only is this approach cost-effective, it also contributes to what Beatriz calls “a radical experiment in optimisation in the sense of maximising functions, especially when it comes to height”. By embracing the principle that not all rooms need to have the same height – standard practice in collective housing – each space is designed to be fit-for-purpose, and storage space is optimised. The living room, for example, with its height of three metres, is three times taller than the bedroom with its one-metre height.
“This reduction does not mean austerity or discomfort,” says Beatriz. “We simply keep what we value and try to get rid of the superfluous. It brings clarity and peace to our minds and our spaces. Possessions take up a lot of space and energy. The Cabanon is of the most luxurious smallness – an epicurean reduction.” st-ar.nl | star_strategies_architecture | b-o-a-r-d.nl | bureau_of_architecture_r_d
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