Portable Dwellings - The dwelling has a proud nomadic past and a bright B.C. future.

Once you get past the name - and who can't help but smile at the word yurt - you come to respect its genius as a portable dwelling virtually unchanged over thousands of years.

Like its domestic peers - the igloo, the teepee, the bedouin tent - a yurt instantly conjures images of proud, nomadic self-sustaining cultures, in this case in faraway places like Mongolia and Siberia, living peacefully off the land.

Surprising then, to spot two yurts - one big, one small - sitting outside an industrial warehouse just off Marine Way in Burnaby.

It's here that a firm called Yurtco makes and sells a modern-day yurt, shipping their custom kits all over the world.

You can find their yurts nestled among the trees in campgrounds in Hawaii and right here in B.C., in provincial parks like Porteau Cove and Alice Lake, where campers rent them by the day.

They're also attracting the attention of residential clients, who are charmed by the hardy little structures and find them a perfect fit for a guest house or getaway cottage on a recreational property.

In the Yurtco warehouse are stacks of sanded and stained lodgepole pines, the backbone of the yurt and the trademark dome and exposed interior rafters that give it its circular structure and rustic appeal.

Yurtco will make just about any size yurt you want, but most start at 12 feet in diameter and the standard kits are the 24-foot and 28-foot models (and, yes, yurts are such an old concept they are still measured in imperial).

A yurt is all about being basic and utilitarian.

The rafters form a solid, picturesque spine, and Douglas fir latticework holds up interior walls. There is heavy-duty vinyl for the roof and layered, bonded polyethylene and aluminum fabric for the outside walls, developed by NASA and providing not only insulation but strong resistance to all manner of weather and four-footed intruders.

Typically built on a wood platform, the yurt's design is flexible enough to accommodate numerous doors and screened windows, that decision being up to the buyer, as are various upgrades such as extra-strength materials for heavier-than-usual snow loads or bear traffic.

Like a traditional cabin, a yurt can be wired and heated and plumbed and furnished with all the mod-cons, or just erected and left in its natural, unfitted splendor.

We as a people, however, are naturally inclined to dress up our domiciles, and yurts are no different.

Yurts are cute and cosy, and low-impact, too

If you'd like a taste of ancient history 21st-century-style, wander down to the BC Home and Garden Show at BC Place this weekend, where one of Yurtco's models has been fitted out by designer Teresa Ryback of Swansburg design studio in Burnaby.

Ryback's firm specializes in luxury interiors and just completed the BC Children's Hospital Lottery grand prize dream home, which has 2,700 square feet on the main floor alone.

The 615-square-foot yurt was, well, a challenge.

"I was like, yurt, what's a yurt?" laughs Ryback. "But I was amazed at the construction, and architecturally it's quite beautiful."

The 28-foot home show yurt has hardwood floors, eight windows, double french doors at the entrance, a single door out back and is divided into several "rooms", including a private area with full bathroom and bedroom, and a public area with a kitchenette, cabana bar and living room.

Ryback put in a heatilator fireplace, and decorated with textures like linens and canvas, choosing natural colours - golds, browns, whites - or the linens, carpets and sectional sofa.

"I think people will be surprised at the versatility and size of the yurt", says Ryback. "It's like a small condo and we wanted to show that it can be quite luxurious."

Structurally, the 28-foot model uses about 50 rafters, and measures 13 feet 4 inches at the centre, with walls that are a standard seven feet high. There is a ceiling fan and five-foot domed skylight that opens for air circulation and brings in a surprising amount of light. The basic model weighs 2,000 pounds and starts at about $9,000.

Beverley Hamann is Yurtco's sales manager and says the company, which started five years ago, is one of several in North America now shipping yurt kits - in their case, about 100 a year - for commercial and private use around the globe.

Yurtco leases about 35 yurts to provincial parks in B.C. and is now working on a shipment for another campground in Hawaii.

Yurts are ideal, says Hamann, for back-country shelters, school annexes, art studios and field offices for forestry and mining firms. She's hoping to interest the 2010 Olympics in using them as warm-up huts for the athletes.

"You walk in the door of a yurt," says Hamann, "and you go, 'wow!' because you look high up at the sky through the dome and the space feels so light and spacious. It just gives you this magical feeling."

Beyond the cute and cosy factor, proponents cite the low impact nature of the yurt, from its ease of build to its almost instantaneous blending into its environment. They crow, too, about its compact sturdiness, its durability and its barometer-like adaptability to temperature, cool and airy under a hot sun and snug and warm in the cold of winter.

Hamann has a file of testimonials, and says the yurt has proven to be a tough little number - wild animals are rebuffed by its reinforced shell, and storms barely ruffle the flaps on its exterior.

Ron Cartwright bought Yurtco's 28-foot kit for his Gulf Island waterfront property in 2003, ater visiting yurts in campgrounds in Washington and Oregon.

He says it took a dozen friends and family members a weekend to build it, and he has since become a devotee of the yurt's pleasing circular lines and strong, lightweight engineering.

"We had a trailer on the property for years and wanted to replace it, but we wanted something with low impact," says Cartwright.

Outside, he added a deck and, inside, some plumbing, along with a Danish wood stove, bunk bed and Jacobean dining suite.

Otherwise, the Cartwright yurt has been kept relatively rustic.

"Summer is a joy with the views and airiness," he says.

"In the cooler periods, with the wood stove going, it is snug and withstands winter storms without a tremor."

Chris Bower, who runs the Nk'Mip Campground and RV Park for the Osoyoos Indian band, says there's been great response to the four big yurts they put up last summer.

The units have air conditioning, can sleep up to eight and rent for $80 to $90 a night.

"They're great for family reunions," says Bower, "and people who travel and don't want to bring their own tent."

Yurts manufactured by Yurtco in
the Nk'Mip Campground in Osoyoos

Back to News Index

HOME