The Alpha Tiny Home Is World’s Second Most Expensive, Quite Gorgeous

Tiny homes are seeing a boom in popularity and have done so for the past two decades. Since 2020, demand for these types of homes has surged considerably, as people were forced into lockdowns and then restricted public outings due to the ongoing health crisis. If one is to spend one’s life indoors, it helps if the house can move easily from one location to another. It also helps if the house can open up completely to the outdoors and there’s no one else around.

Enter the Alpha from New Frontier Tiny Homes.

We’ve spoken about California-based tiny home maker New Frontier before. Founder David Latimer is the mastermind behind the famous Escher, unofficially the world’s most expensive tiny ever built, with a starting price of $180,000. Unfortunately, the Escher burned down in the California fires of 2020, which means that runner-up Alpha is now the unofficial record holder.

The Alpha served as a model for the Escher, being Latimer’s first design (hence the name). It’s a superb, incredibly spacious, and very elegant tiny that offers 240 square feet (22 square meters) of living space in a decidedly elegant interior with plenty of luxury features. This is no regular tiny, mind you: you’re not moving around bumping elbows, and you’re not lacking any of the creature comforts you’re used to in your regular, non-moving house. Instead, as with the Escher, the Alpha is how a wealthy person does downsizing.

The Alpha was commissioned for a couple without children, so it offers sleeping for just two but dining and entertaining for eight. Though it was completed in 2016, it still stands out for its smart design and gorgeous styling, so it would have been worthy of your time even without the dubious merit of being highly expensive.

The Alpha sits on a double-axle trailer and represents a stylish, homey combination of a rustic aesthetic with a more modern style. It’s clad in cedar siding partially treated with the shou sugi ban method of pre-charring the wood, making it fire- and pest-resistant. All glazing is tempered and insulated so it won’t be damaged during transport and will offer warmth in the winter and coolness in the summer. The interior is hardwood and barn wood, with just the right modern touches here and there.

Entrance can be done through either side, either via the drop-down deck and the custom glass garage door, or through the sliding glass door at the opposite end. The idea is that both these doors serve to completely open up the interior – in the tiny house community, there’s a saying about how the most comfortable tiny is the one that encourages you to spend more time outdoors. The Alpha pays heed to that.

On one end of the Alpha is the kitchen, which sits on an elevated platform that cleverly hides an entire 8-person dining set, including a table and two benches, and the library ladder for access to the loft. Customization allows replacing the dining set with a second towable bed and a smaller dining set, or a king-size bed. Everything that tucks away under the platform includes ample storage – so much so that the need for a large wardrobe is completely eliminated.

The kitchen spreads on both sides of the tiny and could be described as a chef’s kitchen. It has a large farmhouse apron sink in stainless steel, a hidden dishwasher, a five-burner induction stovetop, drop-down cabinets, a microwave, extra storage, a large fridge and because this is a premium tiny, granite countertops.

At the opposite end of the Alpha is the bathroom, which, again, is impressive for a tiny. You get a composting dry toilet, a jacuzzi bathtub with shower, a vanity sink, and additional storage. A washer/dryer combo is also located here, so you can run a load of laundry as you soak all your day’s troubles away.

Over the bathroom is the bedroom. It’s more of an alcove, but it comes with a king-size bed, shelves that run around it on three walls, a window, and dimmable lights. You won’t be able to stand up and change into your PJs here, but it does look like the ideal place for a resting night’s sleep.

And now for the cold shower: New Frontier can build you an Alpha to your liking, if you’ve decided to live intentionally and are set on downsizing, but it will cost you. Pricing for this particular model starts at $145,000.