When 28-year-old artist Harrison Marshall moved back to London after a spell abroad, he couldn’t find anywhere to live within his price bracket. So in March 2023 he moved into a converted skip. He had parked the yellow container on a patch of land in Bermondsey and kitted it out with a diminutive galley kitchen and a raised bed under a curved wooden roof.

Amid the affordable housing crisis, tiny houses have emerged as a last resort for those struggling to afford traditional homes. For many they offer a semblance of security and stability in an increasingly punitive housing and labour market.

At the same time, the luxury high-end custom-built tiny homes so popular on social media cater to a largely aspirational middle-class audience. My research shows that the costs involved in building these dwellings, not to mention finding where to put them, can be high. At the core of this movement is a complex interplay between privilege and insecurity.

A creative solution

Marshall has explained that converting a skip was the only way he could afford to live in London. Skip House reportedly cost £4,000 to build, and he pays £50 per month to an arts charity in rental fees for the land.

He has a portaloo onsite, but no running water, so showers at the gym or at work. This is not many people’s idea of luxury, but it is a creative solution.

Many see the idea of a tiny house as a counter-cultural statement against consumerism and the housing market – and the culture of overwork required to finance these two things. Tiny houses can act as a beacon highlighting a simpler, more sustainable way of life.