Can living smaller give you more freedom, or even help you to live a more meaningful life? This is the theory behind the growing Tiny House movement, made up of people building their own extremely adorable, minute (and often portable) dwellings. Whether done out of economic necessity or an urge to simplify life, downsizing can be a way to "live deliberately," in the words Henry David Thoreau, the patron saint of the Tiny House people. Personally, I love the idea that you don't need a big house to live big. Plus, these 400-square-feet-or-less homes make my apartment seem like a McMansion.

Christopher Smith, who had never built anything before, decided to build himself an extremely tiny house, and is now making a documentary about the process.  Just watching the trailer got me thinking about what makes a place a home, what we really need to live--and how easy it would be to clean a 150-square-foot house.

Love it? For the next few days you can help fund the documentary on Kickstarter.

Read more:
The joy of downsizing
Learning to live with less