How the tiny home movement with its focus on responsible choices and living light is catching up in the country | Eye News,The Indian Express
In India, where homes are repositories of memories and heirlooms, we seem to be right-sizing our mindset where bigger does not mean better and less is more
Anna Reddy, a retired teacher from Bengaluru, is living free in the autumn of her life. She has downsized and moved into a 320 sq. ft tiny home that has been upcycled from an old shipping container. Having lived through the loneliness of a lockdown and waking up to the need for smart budgeting as a pensioner, she has chosen to be resource-conscious without feeling the pinch. So, she’s leased a patch of land on a friend’s farm far out of the city, parked her pre-fabricated home on an outcrop overlooking a lake, plushed up the interiors and wrapped herself with a huge sun deck. Apart from sleeping, cooking and chores, she spends sunrise to sundown outdoors, tending to her organic garden, attempting some landscaping with rocks and foliage, writing a blog on the patio, lounging with her dog, dining with friends under the stars and watching the season change colour. “Can we make room for something more meaningful in our lives than clutter it with things that one has no use for and spaces that are unmanageable?” asks the 58-year-old.
Not far down the road are Rohit and Maya Chinnaswamy, both software professionals in their late 20s, who have a tiny home of their own in a land bought years ago by their parents. Just married, and with COVID-19 giving legitimacy to a work-from-home culture, they have created their oasis without the burden of EMIs, living rich rather than squeezing themselves into a city apartment. “Minimalism is not about giving up, it is about choosing what you need. We don’t have the big TV wall but we have a bigger drop-down projector screen,” says Rohit.
The tiny-house movement, which advocates a “living with less philosophy”, is no longer an alternative way of living. As cities bulge out of the seams and shrink the greens, tiny houses are being seen as a sustainable, energy-saving and low-carbon footprint reality than an option. In India, where homes are repositories of memories, collectibles and heirlooms and the acquisitive measure of success, we seem to be right-sizing our mindset where bigger does not mean better and less is more.
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Reddy says she had to cut her belongings by one-third. That wasn’t difficult. “I hadn’t used them in years. But I kept my books. My ‘smart’ kitchen is bigger and more functional. Maintenance fees and bills are now less than half, I am debt-free and can spiff up my home in 15 minutes. My house is small, but I am living big,” says Reddy, who’s working on a wildflower project with the locals. And should she choose to move elsewhere, to the hills or coast, she can dismantle and reassemble her modular home.
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