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Imagine a custom home complete with modern amenities, great storage, energy efficiency, maybe even a rooftop deck … crafted from a shipping container? That’s what interior designer Sheila Gunst and son Sidney Gunst III not only imagined but built, turning the idea into Rustic Global, a business that creates custom homes using the ultimate upcycled material.
R•Home: What’s the appeal of a home made from a shipping container?
Sheila Gunst: Well, to start we can usually build for less money. We are reusing an existing product and not having to use a whole lot of other materials to get that base material built. It’s extremely strong and will withstand weather issues. And it’s mobile — not in terms of a tiny house on wheels — but mobile enough; it can be moved.
R•Home: How can you make a shipping container feel like home?
Gunst: I am an interior designer by trade. I think you can take almost any space and transform it to feel like home. It’s not like I have preconceived models — the whole idea is to sit down with clients and say, “What are you looking for?" and design it within those constraints. It looks totally like a house when you step inside. The layouts can be interesting. The storage can be excellent. All the things I’d do in designing a regular home, I’d do in a shipping container.
Interior designer Sheila Gunst and son Sidney Gunst III
R•Home: What’s the building process like?
Gunst: We bring in various crews, which are essentially the same as any other home. The big difference — because it’s a metal box — is that one of the primary trades is welders. They’re the guys cutting the holes, removing sides and reinforcing them with steel so we can put in windows and doors.
In terms of building permits, it’s different from normal. It’s an education process working with counties to show what we’re doing and how it relates to building codes. It’s usually a bit of an effort up front, and then they’ve got it. But once you’ve cut holes in the box, everything on the inside is exactly what you’d do to build a house.
R•Home: Who are your customers?
Gunst: There’s a whole group of people who have land and just want to put a little something out there, a getaway place. There are also people who want to do an ADU [alternate dwelling unit]; you can put one up for your mother-in-law, for example. And then we’ve got people who want to use multiple units to create a 2,000-square-foot house. We’re combining them, stacking them, doing all kinds of things.
I’m also interested in using them for transitional housing … a place for folks who might be experiencing things like financial, domestic difficulties, a place to stay while they put together a plan to move on, and the homeless housing package. There are places in this country that have communities built from shipping containers for the homeless.
In addition to that, such as in Las Vegas, they’ve created entertainment areas, bars, restaurants, stages, parks … there’s a whole public space use as well. They can be anything with a little bit of imagination.
