To paraphrase the one and only Mariah Carey, "tiny homes, I don’t know her." Even against the current backdrop of fast development of tiny houses and other types of alternative mobile houses, the Truck Cabin remains a most badass, magical, and inspiring mobile home – and absolutely peerless.
Truck Cabin hails back to a time when not every content creator dreamed of turning nomad for the sake of monetizing this lifestyle on social media. It goes back to the days when mobile homes weren't as frequent as they are today, and maybe we weren't numbed by the overwhelming number of options.
This sounds like the kind of nostalgia old age is usually associated with, the "oh, things were better in every possible way back in my time" kind. That's probably because the Truck Cabin looks like something an old person, like some kind of wise and powerful wizard, would live in. It's also because it came before the current #vanlife and downsizing frenzy sweeping the world.
More importantly, the Truck Cabin was born not to show off online but out of love.
Photo: Instagram/Sara Underwood
It's the work of former teacher turned carpenter Jacob Witzling and his life partner, model and actress Sara Underwood. Witzling's impressive portfolio counts several constructions that have made headlines around the world, most of them wooden cabins with the same magical vibe to them, rendered completely off-grid. But this one was his first project with Sara.
The two have since perfected their art with Cabinland, a Pacific Northwest compound made up of several equally magical structures: Diamond Cabin, the jaw-dropping Castle Cabin, Wardrobe Cabin, Pump Cabin, a garden shed, and the now-parked Truck Cabin, which now doubles as a storage unit. They're also working on a Desert Cabinland as of the time of writing.
In a way, Truck Cabin was the build that got them completely in sync and also the first one that Witzling did for himself exclusively. Up to that point, he had built cabins on friends' and family's land in exchange for permission to live in them temporarily. The Truck Cabin was his and Sara's first home, and they ended up taking it on a trip from coast to coast, living in it permanently while they explored nomad life.
Photo: Instagram/Sara Underwood
It wasn't always an easy life, mostly because vintage trucks tend to break down a lot, but it was a memorable one.
The base for this unique mobile home is a 1979 Ford F-250 truck, with the bed of the pickup truck serving as the main part of the house. Like everything these two have built together, Truck Cabin was made with recycled materials, exclusively wood inside and out, and a particular style meant to serve both in terms of efficiency and aesthetics.
Truck Cabin was completed in 2018 and offered a 40 square-foot (3.7 square-meter) base for daily living and a 20 square-foot (1.8 square-meter) loft over the cab, designed exclusively for sleeping. Awning windows provided plenty of natural light and cross-current to keep the loft from feeling too claustrophobic, and furniture was designed to be multi-functional.
Photo: Instagram/Sara Underwood
The living area consisted of a full kitchen on one side and a bench on the other, with integrated storage. The interior was most definitely compact and basic in terms of features, but it was enough to get Sara and Jacob on what they'd later describe as the experience of a lifetime: 20,000 miles (32,187 km) across the country, enjoying experiences they would have never had if they had stayed in one place.
The most striking feature of the Truck Cabin, other than the fact that it's a cabin inside the bed of a truck (duh), was the irregular, swooping shingled roof. Jacob once explained that he’d designed it "to have as few right angles as possible, so that it would cut through the high winds on the freeway, but also look unique." The theme of combining a unique aesthetic with functionality will become prevailing in his work.
After a while on the road, the Truck Cabin was parked at the site of the future Rainforest Cabinland. Jacob and Sara continued to take it out, though for much shorter stretches and only as a kind of glamping solution, replacing the kitchen with a larger sleeping area before they eventually decided to gut it altogether so they could use the space inside as storage.
Photo: Instagram/Jacob Witzling
Even today, the Truck Cabin still runs, though it's far from the gorgeous, magical appearance it was back in the day on the road. The Ford truck is rusted and in visible need of some TLC, and the home on top is a mere windowless, rather sad shell. Even so, Jacob and Sara still take it out every once in a while, if only for a short ride to the beach, and it still attracts the same kind of attention it did in its glory days.
For fellow builders, DIY-ers, and wannabe nomads, the Truck Cabin is still an incredible, most magical, and badass source of inspiration.
Elena has been writing for a living since 2006 and, as a journalist, she has put her double major in English and Spanish to good use. She covers automotive and mobility topics like cars and bicycles, and she always knows the shows worth watching on Netflix and friends. Full profile
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