Fabulous!! Thanks for posting such a great reminder of how awesome and progressive Vancouver is!

Lovely – thanks for the photos!

(Aside: wow that kitchen sink is tiny)

I am not sure I agree with this being the first one. One of our old neighbours built a laneway house above their garage in our alley. Maybe that was just an “apartment” but it was very similar in look. Such great idea.

Heather, If I understand correctly, these are slightly different in that the lot is split and the laneway house is owned by a new homeowner, as opposed to a rented suite. Its a pretty awesome way for Vancouver to allow us to densify while offering affordable housing for many of our young families!!

I could get comfortable in that!

Heather, here’s the original piece on Vancouver laneway housing and the new bylaw that’s allowing these to be made: http://vancouverisawesome.com/2009/08/11/little-houses-in-the-lanies/

There are some lane houses in the city that date back to the 20s, in other places there are “infill dwellings” that are much larger and can be strata-titled. In some zones you can do coach houses (like Peter Eller / Splyce Design’s nice project at ecoloft.ca).

The Mcgill Lane House, by contrast, is the first project completed under the new “Laneway Housing” guidelines which were adopted last summer.

Also, please note, the price for this unit would be ~$190,000 (vs. the $250,000 quoted in the article).

Thanks for the positive vibes!

Bryn Davidson certainly knows what he is doing.