The Backyard Office Box (B.O.B.) was originally conceived as a small-scale, design-build project experimenting with typical building materials, prefabricated construction, and a kit of parts for deployment based on varying locations and potential clients. The B.O.B. as an accessory dwelling space creates an opportunity for users to add a home office, studio, library, etc. to their own home. The B.O.B. was also designed to accept more than a backyard as a possible site, with enough consideration to be placed in more remote locations to be possibly used as a temporary shelter or a getaway cabin.

The project was designed and built by a team of three. Constraints on construction and design were therefore limited by this small construction team with conventional hand tools, but also by light trucks being the main source of deployment transportation. Not only was small team construction part of the equation, but also the B.O.B. was constrained by 150 square feet to avoid the hassle of local building permits. These parameters set the dimensional aspects of the project. The prefabricated kit of parts is also designed to be managed by the small assembly team without heavy machinery.

Due to a limited budget and as a testament to the amount of value lost in typical construction waste, the B.O.B. is constructed with a large amount of reclaimed, repurposed, and salvaged materials. These strategies of recovered consumption led the B.O.B. to have a cost of $19 per square foot.

Teammates: Tr3s (Jonathan Chavez, Adam Shilling)