In the driveway of a suburban house in Ballarat sits what might be a cross between a caravan and a shipping container on wheels.
“A tiny home on wheels”
Somehow it avoids looking too much like either; it has a unique solidity until you approach it from the rear.
Suddenly it becomes part-Romany caravan, part-modern solution to accommodation problems.
It is a ‘tiny house on wheels’, according to Ann and Ron Dimmer, who built it entirely by hand.
At six metres by two-and-a-half metres, almost three metres high, and weighing three tonnes, it’s more substantial than your run-of-the-mill caravan. But a mobile home it is, and as such requires no planning permit from council.
And that’s one reason why Rob Dimmer built it.
“It circumvents certain council regulations,” he says matter of factly.
“If you were to build something like that permanently, you’d have to have a planning permit and building permit. But because it's on wheels and it's registered, it becomes a trailer, like a caravan.”
Ann Dimmer adds that in order for the tiny home to avoid council scrutiny, it has to be VicRoads compliant and it must remain registered.
“You can’t just park it in your backyard and then forget about it,” she says.
While avoiding council regulation might be one outcome of building a tiny house on wheels, the inspiration for it comes from sources nearer to Ann and Rob’s heart.
One is their shared love of woodworking and of recycling timber sourced from old buildings and demolitions. The trailer – indeed most of their home – is renovated with furniture and fittings that Rob has salvaged and remade with his skills, from his time in the RAAF until the present.
The other inspiration is their son Andrew, who lives with his parents. Andrew is 47 and has a brain injury from birth. He is a high-functioning Asperger’s person who also has autistic tendencies which require him to have a private space of his own.
He lives in a detached room at the the rear of the Dimmer’s Frank Street home. While Rob jokes that he told his son they might move him into the tiny home (an idea not well-received at all by Andrew), Ann says his situation gave them reason to think about the way the tiny house was built, and what uses it could be put to.
“One person could live in there,” Ann says.
“You could put a single Murphy bed. We didn't want a loft, because if it's an older person or someone with disabilities, you don't want stairs and ladders. You want it all on the same level.”
“It’s very adaptable,” adds Rob.
“We left spaces in for a fridge or washer or dryer. The reality of it is if you’re a person like our son who doesn't want a fridge or a stove or anything like that, you could put an extra bench there for computers.”
“There's no cooking facilities, so someone could live in there with a toaster and a kettle and a fridge,” says Ann.
“They couldn't cause any damage with that, and that's what also helps make it a remote bedroom by not having the cooking facilities, not having the dangers of gas, hotplates or electric hotplates left on. For a disabled or homeless person it would be perfect.
You could put a single Murphy bed. We didn't want a loft, because if it's an older person or someone with disabilities, you don't want stairs and ladders. You want it all on the same level.
- Ann Dimmer
“We had an open weekend and we were overwhelmed with the number of people. We would have had nearly 200 people through. (Local MP) Sharon Knight was one of them. She's part of an organisation to do with people with disabilities and homeless people, and she said what a wonderful thing it could be for people who had to live at home or something like that. People with a disability could live in the backyard of their carers.
“They're not really expensive to make and can be relocated just simply by towing them somewhere else. You tow, you park and you plug in. We’re trying to get across to people these are tiny houses.They’re compact; they’re ideal for people starting up, like first home buyers. They want to live with mom and dad but not physically with them. Out in the backyard, have your independence, come and go.”
The Dimmer’s estimate the build has cost around $45,000. The trailer chassis was $15,000 of that cost, and they say the fitout may have been more expensive because they chose quality goods.
“We didn’t want to put cheap stuff into it, so we paid a bit extra,” says Rob. They estimate the tiny home took four months to build, but it was not a full time occupation.
“I find timber more tactile, more pleasurable to work with”
Rob Dimmer had a career as a fitter with the RAAF, but takes more pleasure now in working with timber rather than metal. He says he found welding a dirty, smelly job, and prefers the different lustres of wood.
“I find timber more tactile, more pleasurable to work with,” he says.
“The back door of the trailer is blackwood and the feature wall inside is recycled Victorian hardwoods. If someone renovates an old house around here and they chuck all the timber out, I’ll go and get it. I like it with all the marks over it and the nail holes and screw holes. I hate seeing it being wasted.”
So much so, when the RAAF decided to demolish its 1921 dental clinic at Point Cook, Rob pleaded for time to remove the New Zealand kauri bench inside the building.
“I’d been over to the buildings a few times and I’d seen this bench, and I coveted it,” Rob says.
“They were going to get rid of the whole building, and I said, ‘well if you're going to do that, can I have some of the stuff out of the offices, all this beautiful kauri?’
“And they basically said, ‘Well we're going to pull it down tomorrow, so you can have whatever you can get out of here today.’”
As dedicated recyclers, the Dimmers have used everything from 42 old Footscray church pews to discarded mesh bed frames to create furniture and fittings for their home.
If someone renovates an old house around here and they chuck all the timber out, I’ll go and get it. I like it with all the marks over it and the nail holes and screw holes. I hate seeing it being wasted.
- Rob Dimmer
“A lot of people here know that we like to recycle and upcycle, so quite often they’ll come and say ‘I’ve got this or I’ve got that, come and have a look,’” says Ann.
Rob’s workshops are a testament to his 27 years of military engineering and precision, although he modestly argues they are too dusty.
Piles of blackwood are neatly stacked on one side; the remaining church pews on another. Power tools are laid out for maximum efficiency.
Having lived in 25 houses in his lifetime, across Australia and overseas, both Rob and Ann say they know what works in a house and what doesn’t.
“No house is perfect for everyone,” says Rob.
“We’ve learnt a lot over the years. We just like building. We’ve renovated or built 10 houses over the years. I’ve had 55 years of building things and I want to pass that knowledge on.”
And is it an addiction?
“Is it what. Tell me about it,” Rob laughs.
The Dimmer tiny home on wheels will be having an open day this Saturday June 16 from 10am until 3pm at 107 Frank Street, Ballarat.
