icicles-houses / Green Building & Sustainable Home Renovation Information & Advice

Top Tips for Getting a House Ready for Winter
Wall assemblies - renovation

Winter preparation for your home - are you ready for the cold?

Top Tips for preparing a home for winter Extremely low temperatures over winter can test your home in many ways, and sometimes your house will return a failing grade. Even brand new homes built to code can see failures of their building envelopes, windows, doors and ventilation systems during winter, a simple failure t...

A Tiny House for sale locally set me thinking, should I buy a Tiny Home?
Tiny house

ARE TINY HOUSES FOR SALE LOCALLY A GOOD CHOICE FOR A FIRST HOME?

To buy, or not to buy, a tiny house on wheels? That is the question... I’ve recently been looking at Tiny Homes for sale, mostly THOW's, but first, the background. As a single woman approaching the “big 3-0”, and especially with current events forcing changes in everyday life, I realize how lucky I’ve been to spend the...

Affordable Modern Prefab Eco Homes Available - The S1600
Off-grid and Net-Zero Housing

The S1600 - affordable modern prefab eco homes for families

Affordable prefab eco homes are a growing green home building trend across the US and Canada, as you may have already seen on our pages or in the press. Economies of scale, the savings in materials and the speed and quality of construction are certainly motivating factors persuading homebuyers to take a fresh look at p...

Construction of a 3D printed concrete home © all3dep.com
Architecture and plan design

3D Printed Homes: Is this the Future of Residential Construction?

We've seen more and more headlines calling 3D Printed homes, "the way of the future," with their "construction in less than 24 hours!" Billed as the ideal solution to counter the global housing crisis and more resistant than traditional homes, the answer to the climate emergency according to many media reports is 3D pr...

Mobile tiny house
Tiny house

Is Tiny House living in a cold climate good or bad for the planet?

Are Tiny Houses Worth it? Are Tiny houses a good investment? That depends on your lifestyle and how well you build them. Here are some things to think about before you join the Tiny House Movement and commit to life in an extremely small space.  We have featured a number of tiny houses on our pages over the past few ye...

A sustainably built, ultra modern and affordable tiny house
Tiny house

NOMAD Micro Home fuelled by crowd funding, takes green building world by storm.

With write-ups in Gizmag, Inhabitat, Tiny House Design, FastCoExist and well, too many other places to recount, one could say it's clear that the green building world is enamoured with this Tiny House gem, and so are we. What's not to love: NOMAD Micro Homes are sustainably manufactured, easy to assemble, affordable, a...

Tiny Houses encouraged Washington State for Affordable Housing WA
Tiny house

Tiny Houses - Washington State promotes tiny homes & Eco-villages for Affordable Housing in WA

WA Paves the Way for Tiny Home Eco-Villages: Tiny houses, also colloquially referred to as tiny homes, are both an increasingly attractive and affordable housing option as well as a trending alternative lifestyle choice across North America and Canada as people realize that “quality of life” doesn’t depend on surroundi...

Home construction
How to Find Qualified Green Building Professionals

Hiring professionals or doing it yourself

1. Hiring an architect: We discussed previously the idea of choosing an architect that specializes in high-performance Eco-friendly home design and can co-ordinate the work. They should be able to help you find general contractors and subcontractors that can help you carry out your work according to plan. This route is...

A Tiny House with a Greenhouse - Yes it's Possible!

Tiny House with attached and mobile greenhouse - good or bad idea?

The tiny house movement is a fascinating trend that draws attention to one of the greatest problems with the housing industry; how big our homes have become. But the custom homes being built on trailer beds have many limitations, mainly because they need to comply with the rules of the road as a vehicle. So they aren’t...

The Fiction Factory Wikkelhouse tiny house made of carboard
Tiny house

Wikkelhouse: A tiny house made of cardboard

Seriously, no pun intended - it's just hard not to describe the cardboard Wikkelhouse as anything other than an extreme case of thinking outside of the box. It's like there is some kind of one-upmanship going on in the tiny house movement that has builders forever taking design and material use to new levels. Don't mis...

The Fincube tin house
Tiny house

The Fincube off-grid tiny house

The Fincube is a pre-fab multi-purpose dwelling, it's built to operate off-grid, it's portable, and it's beautiful. It's also made in Italy so would hardly be a "green" choice for a North American dweller, but one can't help but be inspired by it just the same.  The most obvious and unusual design feature about the Fin...