This used to be a moldy office container—now it’s Aamu and Antti’s brilliant backyard office and guest house
Aamu and Antti Kuuslahti’s home was getting cramped, but they couldn’t sell it or build an addition. So, they bought a used office container for under €4,000 and converted it into a tiny extra house in their garden that can be relocated to a new plot if needed.
Wow, what a lovely guest house! Aamu, why did you renovate a small house from a container in your garden?
About four years ago, when the pandemic hit, we wanted to escape Helsinki for some countryside calm. We bought a 1940s detached house and have spent the past few years renovating it with traditional methods.
When our youngest—now three—was on the way, we realized the house would be too small. It has three bedrooms, and there are six of us now. We first thought about adding on or buying a new house. We were already applying for permits when we learned that one proposed train route of the East Rail from Helsinki to Kouvola would run right over our home. That ended the addition idea. We can’t buy another house, either, because we can’t sell this one. So we had to get creative.
The idea of a small guest house beside the main house popped up when the building code here changed—you can now put up a garden building under 30 square meters on your own lot without a permit.
The house used to be an office container—how did you choose that solution?
At first we looked at prefab cottages and kit-built garden houses, but none felt right. I value recycling and wanted to use reclaimed materials for this project, too. That sparked the idea of converting a shipping or office container.
Here’s what the container looked like before:
Where did you find the container, and what did it cost?
I found a company selling used containers through the online marketplace Tori, conveniently close to home. They had a beat-up office container: the floor was gone, water had poured in through the roof, and the insulation was moldy. That didn’t bother us—we were going to renovate anyway. We agreed on €3,900, and a week later a crane truck set the container in our garden.
How did you renovate the container
First we installed the foundations: ten screw piles drilled three meters deep. If the rail line does go over our house, we can simply move the container to a new plot.
We stripped out every interior surface. We hired a builder to draw plans for raising the roof and adding the gable, and another professional to carry out the work. The container was insulated with cellulose fiber and air-seal paper, and we sheathed the walls and ceiling with OSB.
For the floor we laid reclaimed floorboards that Antti and my brother-in-law salvaged from an old post-war house in Espoo. The windows were rescued from a 1920s log house in Karkkila, and the bathroom door came from an allotment cottage in Helsinki—all sourced through the Tori marketplace. I also found some vintage paper wallpaper there, though not enough for the whole container, so I bought more at a hardware store.
How much has the extension cost overall?
Altogether we’ve spent about €20,000 on the container project. That covers the container, labor, and everything from the composting toilet to the wallpaper. We still need to run permanent power; for now we’re using an extension cord from the house.
How have you been using the container so far?
I use the 25-square-meter container as my studio when I sew linen clothing. My husband can work remotely there or just enjoy some quiet time, and the kids play in the container with their friends.
There’s a sleeping loft where you can stay overnight. No one has slept there yet, but we’ll be able to host guests later. Antti and I could also spend a night there with one child at a time if they need some one-on-one time.
