They want to change the way we think about space, challenging the assumption that less square footage necessarily equates to a sacrifice in quality of living. With shoebox-size homes now a reality for many, they are asking how to make the minuscule beautiful and the tiny practical.

“The trend seems to be smaller places more thoughtfully engineered,” says Sydney-based Karen McCartney, author of Superhouse. “Size is not always the goal. Architects are able to [do] things that the ordinary person can’t imagine, changing the way that space can be used.”

East meets West

In a ryokan, or traditional Japanese inn, a housemaid rolls down the tatami mat for guests to sleep on at night and rolls it up again in the morning before serving breakfast and dinner in the same room. The YO! Home, likewise, takes its ethos from the East with furniture viewed as moving parts rather than solid fixtures.

“Is pressing a button and waiting 10 seconds [for the bed to lower] more annoying than walking into a different room or up a flight of stairs? It’s just adjusting to a different way of living,” shrugs Jack Spurrier, managing director of YO! Home.

By contrast, the Western-style studio, with everything crammed, fixed together, in a single room, is awkward, insists Spurrier:“do you sit on the bed or the sofa?”

One solution is the Murphy bed, a clunky spring-loaded fold-out that is stored vertically against the wall. But Woodroffe wanted something more luxurious, replacing the Japanese housemaid and tatami mat with slick technology (the YO! Home will arrive with an operation manual, much like a car, and each block will have a dedicated management team on site) and appealing to what he calls the tech-savvy ‘Austin Powers type’ who gets a natural high from groovy décor.

Design for life

Yet micro-homes are far more than the latest design fad. They are being pegged as part of a broader set of tools and trends being adapted in Western cities to breathe life into downtown areas.