Furniture Design, Arrangement, Relationship to Tiny House and Remote Working Activity

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 System Planning Laboratory, Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Chiba University, Chiba, Japan.

2 Department of Design, School of Science and Engineering, Chiba University, Chiba, Japan.

Abstract

Urbanization in most countries leads to limited space and tiny houses. The trend of remote work is also growing rapidly. However, residential properties are not typically designed as spaces for working activities, such as remote work. Furniture design for workspaces is also usually not designed for residential spaces. This study examines the perspectives of 15 professional designers, as captured through Key Informant Interviews (KIIs), on designing workspaces and potential furniture types for remote work across the 30 selected tiny-house floor plans. Discussions with KII’s show that with a suitable spatial configuration and appropriate furniture, a tiny house's limited space can accommodate a work area. As a result, most KII’s agree on the semi-open arrangement with several values as the furniture configuration for tiny houses. Even though 27.83% of modified floor plans show an increment in the percentage of multi-purpose space to maximize the area. The discussion also shows that the workspace area for a specific area has increased by 12.64% compared to the original floor plan. The suitable furniture for the multi-purpose space identified in this study was built-in or custom. This configuration study could help designers design and explore suitable furniture according to the spaces in tiny houses.

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

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Journal of Design Thinking
Volume 7, Issue 1
June 2026
Pages 99-108

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