How Much Space Does a Person Really Need? | Grandma Kouzi

I once wrote How Much Land Does a Person Need?, and experience has shown that a modest plot of roughly an acre is entirely sufficient to meet all my life’s needs.

So, for someone living on that smallholding, just how much living space is actually required? I want to respect nature and avoid wasting land, yet still meet practical needs and not live too harshly. What size strikes the right balance?

I’ve also written about A Home on a Slurry Grid, detailing “Building No. 1 in Wicked Valley”—a 32-square-metre prefabricated cabin constructed over an elevated slurry drainage network. I owe that house a great deal of gratitude. It turned my dream of “living off the land” into reality. Built and ready to move into within just two months, it met every practical requirement and provided me with irreplaceable companionship and support.

● “Evil Man Valley No. 1” under construction.

But “No. 1” was simply too large, so big it left me feeling uneasy. Though it was fully elevated and hardly compacted any soil, everything needs the sun to grow, and where light is blocked, not even grass will sprout. I once tried cultivating mushrooms beneath the pig manure net. Over two years, I bought several types of spawn, but none took hold. I feel rather ashamed that, to accommodate a single person’s life, I created such an extensive lifeless zone.

For various reasons, I set about building “Evil Man Valley No. 2”. It proved that the space one person truly needs can be far smaller than 32 square metres.

● “Evil Man Valley No. 2” newly completed.

I. First Summer: All Things Beneficial

In August 2021, I moved into Evil Man’s Valley during the dog days of summer. Almost everyone insisted an air conditioner was an absolute necessity, but it was not a luxury I could enjoy; to me, it was a “natural disaster”. My otherwise hardy constitution turns out to be uniquely vulnerable to air conditioning: cross its path, and a cold is guaranteed.

“Evil Man’s Valley No. 1” came with neither an air conditioner nor an electric fan, as neither was needed. Though assembled quickly as a temporary cabin, I added an extra insulating layer between the outer OSB boards: 10 cm of fibreglass insulation. A roof overhang shields the structure from direct sunlight, while its elevated base keeps it dry, ensuring good airflow without any stifling heat. The interior is completely open on all sides, featuring three doors and over a dozen windows, left wide open to catch the breeze from every direction. Even when the sun outside was scorching, I could simply retreat into the cabin and let a calm mind bring its own natural coolness.

● The large, open windows of “Evil Valley No. 1” were not fitted with fly screens.

● Vegetable seeds were sown beneath the pig manure netting immediately after “No. 1” was completed.

● The design of “No. 1” also took full account of a rural household’s everyday need for drying goods.

Under the shelter of the cabin, my first days in Villain Valley saw me through a pleasant summer and autumn, but winter brought its own problem: a lack of insulation.

II. The First Winter: Without “Righteous Qi”, Without Temper

Northerners simply don’t understand southern cold. “Northern cold inflicts physical damage; southern cold inflicts magical damage.” You truly only grasp the weight of this saying through lived experience.

I once endured a winter of minus 28 degrees Celsius on the Loess Plateau, but northern cold is dry. No matter how biting the weather, you don’t fear it; you just dress appropriately. Besides, there’s central heating indoors, so stepping inside does the trick. In Fujian, however, the moment temperatures dip into single digits, you enter a realm where “no amount of clothing makes a difference.”

Southern cold always arrives hand in hand with dampness. The moisture magnifies the chill infinitely, making its biting power unparalleled. When I went to the town post office, a female postal worker in a thin uniform laughed at my extravagant layers: “It’s not even below freezing yet. Aren’t you northerners used to minus ten or twenty degrees?” I felt like crying: “Minus ten or twenty is true, but we have central heating indoors.” She laughed again: “Northerners survive winter thanks to central heating. We rely on a body full of righteous qi.”

A deficit of righteous qi can be fatal. Despite wrapping myself in every layer I owned, my uncooperative ears still froze, swelling thick and red with the dignified plumpness of braised pig’s ears.

The southern chill is not only cold and damp, but also endures with stubborn longevity. There’s a local proverb: “Around Qingming, tigers freeze to death.” I’ve since learned my lesson; I won’t wash or put away my down jacket until after Qingming, keeping it on standby. When I boasted about my foresight, a neighbour chuckled: “I only wash my down jacket after the May Day holiday.”

The cold of the south is something you only truly know once you’ve felt it. Regardless of what others might laugh at, layering up desperately to stay alive strips you of both “righteous qi” and morale. Trussed up in excessively heavy garments, you feel compressed, hunched, and utterly unable to stretch out.

By day, you lack “righteous qi”; by night, you lose your temper. All the virtues of “Villain Valley No. 1” in the summer transformed into flaws in winter—the temperature inside matched the outside, and the perceived chill was even lower.

In the damp, freezing south, everything feels clammy and icy to the touch, including spare clothes and bedding. Getting into bed isn’t difficult; the electric blanket handles that. But getting out is a different matter. Even a trip to the toilet requires a thirty-minute battle of wills.

●The small bedstead retained in ‘Evil Valley No. 1’ folds against the wall by day, relying entirely on an electric blanket through winter. Photograph by Wang Hao.

After careful study, I’ve found that the locals’ resilience to the cold—and that invincible “righteous qi” they carry—has deep roots. Since childhood, I’d often hear the saying: “There is no wall in the world that doesn’t let the wind through.” Born and raised in the north, I always took this to mean the ancients lived truly hard lives. Northern winters are bitterly cold; if even the walls are drafty, how is anyone meant to survive?

Now I can be certain this proverb must have originated in the south. In northern winters, a drafty, leaky house could genuinely freeze you to death. That’s why northern homes—whether built of brick and tile, adobe, or mud—feature thick walls that firmly reject gaps, constructed to be completely airtight.

But the wooden plank houses common in the south tell a different story. Their “walls” are merely a single layer of boards. No matter how the grooves are cut and the planks fitted together, gaps remain. Through thermal expansion and contraction, as well as swelling and shrinking with moisture, those gaps only widen. For every plank in a wall, there is a corresponding crack.

Truly, there is no wall that doesn’t let the wind through. Damp, chilling drafts pass straight through unimpeded. The southern knack for weathering the cold is thus a foundation laid in childhood, naturally forging that famed “righteous qi”. But I long missed the prime window for such training. The more I tried to adapt, the weaker I became; I’ve ended up like the “cold-wailing bird” from folklore, shivering daily while swearing a solemn vow: I will absolutely build a heated kang.

III. Wooden Planks Can Make an Airtight Wall, Too

I followed through. As soon as the rainy season ended, I began sourcing materials to build my heated-room dwelling—my ‘Evil Villain Valley No. 2’.

I set my sights on the traditional wooden barns once common on local farms. Back in the day, every farming household would have one. They were built on all six sides using quality fir planks, joined entirely with mortise and tenon joinery, meaning not a single metal nail was needed to hold the whole structure together. Times have moved on, of course. Modern homes are built without barns, and the old ones have been stripped apart and sold for their timber. You can pick one up for around a thousand yuan.

And I bought four of them outright.

Each barn is roughly square, so the heated room would take the shape of a rectangle formed by joining two of them side by side. I bought the extra two to harvest their timber for building completely airtight walls. Every wall section uses double-layer boarding, with a layer of tarpaulin and fibreglass insulation sandwiched between the planks. This approach preserves the authentic, rustic look of the original barns while guaranteeing the space stays completely draught-free.

●Enjoying the sunset by the window during the construction of “No. 2”.

When local friends heard I was planning to live in a barn, they all asked whether I knew where they used to lock up thieves back in the day. It was right here, in the barn.

Cramped, claustrophobic, lightless and airtight – the barn was fit for a temporary holding cell. How could anyone possibly live in it? Yet I was determined to transform this wooden box – so airtight that not even a mouse could squeeze in nor a thief slip out – into a dwelling that could both brave the harsh cold and stay well-ventilated and comfortable.

The only way to dispel the claustrophobia is with light and air. I bought a freezer door from a scrap yard for ten yuan; its double-glazed glass was both transparent and insulating, and I fitted it into the roof of the heated sleeping quarters. As for the kitchen, it needed not just light but airflow, so I installed a pair of double-glazed windows that open outwards, cut an opening in the ceiling, and fitted a large-diameter, turbine-style roof vent.

With the light and airflow sorted, I turned to the cramped dimensions. Using an old barn for a tiny house had been the plan all along, but I never intended to make the interior brutally tight. The large barn is traditionally known as a “six-foot granary”, nominally two metres square, though the internal measurement was actually 1.95 metres – just under four square metres. I widened it slightly, from 1.95 to 2.2 metres. To accommodate storage, I extended the right-hand side outwards, creating a built-in wardrobe and bookshelf for my clothes throughout the seasons and the books I’m currently reading.

The kitchen, which adjoins the heated sleeping quarters, kept the 2.2-metre width but extended in length to 2.7 metres, bringing the floor area to just short of six square metres. Combined, the sleeping area and kitchen measure just over ten square metres.

●The exterior of “No. 2” shortly after completion. The right half, with the windows, is the kitchen; the left side houses the heated sleeping quarters. Outside, the large stove and bread oven are attached.

●The south-facing exterior of “No. 2”; the black section is a drying cabinet that captures residual heat from the heated bed.

IV. All Daily Needs Covered: Eating, Drinking, Toileting, Reading, and Exercise

The primary function of a living space is to fulfil your needs. For me, that simply boils down to eating, drinking, toileting, reading, and exercising.

Size is secondary; if a space meets your requirements, it’s a good place to live.

The 1.2-metre bed in the sleeping area is ample for a single occupant. By offsetting it, I can also lay out a 1.2-metre yoga mat, covering my mat-based workouts. The cooking zone revolves around a rocket stove, with its 60-cm diameter chimney heat exchanger and wood-feeding port facing south, connecting to the sleeping area. Arranged around this central point, firewood is stored beneath the basin on the east wall, a long ledge along the windowsill provides storage for kitchenware and cups, and there is room for a compact travel kettle.

● The eastern sink and windowsill provide a space for boiling water and preparing meals.

● View from the kang area looking outwards. Sliding open the panels beside the bed and the doors of the storage cabinet transforms the open sleeping space into a fully enclosed bedroom.

In the north-east corner by the door, a floor-to-ceiling corner cabinet fits snugly against the wall, housing various knick-knacks alongside an electric griddle and kettle. The cleared space in the centre of the tiny kitchenette is just wide enough for skipping rope. All personal requirements—clothing, food, shelter, and leisure—are effortlessly met indoors.

Though the home is compact, it allows for complete solitary freedom, yet is equally suited to gathering round a stove. Against the north wall, between the east and west doors, a piece of timber over two centuries old rests flush against the wall to act as my bench. Bring in another long timber, brace it between the east and west walls, and you have a large dining table. Line up the wide benches and you can comfortably seat seven or eight people, all ready to dig in with gusto.

●Lay the long boards in place and seven or eight can gather round the stove; take them down and it’s open for skipping. Most days, though, I just set up a single lounge chair here.

●Last winter, I recorded a podcast with Foodthink sitting right here in this chair. Photo: Wang Hao.

The west wall serves multiple purposes. The original design featured a folding desk. A barn door panel was fixed to the wall: lowered, it functions as a desk, and when folded up, it stows neatly above the window.

This photograph was taken in 2022, straight after construction was completed but before I moved in. I was rather proud of the folding desk claiming centre stage. I soon discovered, though, that such a sprawling surface in a compact kitchen creates both visual and physical obstruction. The chair that came with the desk completely blocked the way up to the heated bed.

Consequently, this rather grand desk was folded away. Without the high table, the windowsill panel hidden beneath it was repurposed into a bench and table. A simple soft cushion placed on the steps leading into the heated bed area provided seating.

Keeping flat surfaces completely clear is a lazy person’s maxim for compact living. Everything has its place: items above are mounted on the wall, while those below are stashed away. This means benches, stools, and reclining chairs can be used interchangeably, and whether you feel like reading or simply zoning out, the space accommodates it.

Once comfortably seated, every item mounted on the walls or tucked away remains within easy reach. A kettle, a small pot, an electric griddle – whatever you fancy eating or drinking can be prepared with minimal effort.

The seat crafted from the old doorboard is remarkably wide and even suitable for cross-legged meditation. Eating or reading here works well enough, provided you sit slightly angled. If you need to sit with proper posture for typing or writing on a computer, a concealed panel underneath slides out to form a dedicated desk.

●For the desk, the cushions rest on the steps leading to and from the kang. They can be tucked away at a moment’s notice, and sliding out a wooden board is all it takes to assemble a computer desk.

V. Reclaiming My Warmth and Vigour with the Kang

I used to dread the damp drizzle and dropping temperatures, a fear that would make my heart race. But the warm kang gives me the confidence to fear nothing. A cold snap? I head straight back to light a fire. With 5°C outside and 15°C inside, if I don’t quickly cover the stove opening to bank the flames, the room will easily hit 25°C.

Once the body is warm, it naturally loosens up. Carrying that steady inner heat, I barely notice the cold when I step out. Folks have begun to wonder why I dress so lightly: “Aren’t you freezing?” — As a northerner, I’ve finally managed to cultivate that “inner warmth and vigour”, even down here in the south.

●Filling “No. 2’s” rocket stove with firewood in winter. Photograph: Wang Hao.

The shift is not merely in temperature, but in humidity as well. The drizzle of ‘Hui Nan Tian’ can linger for ten or fifteen days on end, the air so heavy with moisture that a film of water beads across the tiled floors and walls.

Fujian has seen an unusually wet year. By the end of March, amidst the biting damp chill and gales, I took refuge in my little nook, banked the stove, and put on a light, dry set of clothes to begin writing about the fire burning by my side. The spring rains lingered well into May. With the stove aglow to dry my clothes, and the fields too waterlogged to work, I pulled out my drafts and set about revising them.

I am deeply grateful for this modest shelter and the warmth of the stove, which allow me to find my footing amid this protracted downpour and heavy mist. Yet, when I think of those left to brave the bleak, driving rain with nothing but their own resilience to lean on, I ask Heaven to pardon my quiet sense of smug relief.

VI. How Much Space Does One Person Actually Need?

By 16 June this year, it will be exactly three years since I arrived at Eren Valley.

In truth, even without chemical fertilizers or pesticides, that patch of mine could easily yield enough for more than just me. Chasing maximum output would only exhaust both myself and the soil. I have no desire for a relationship of mutual extraction between land and labourer; so I’ve simply taken a step back, allowing us both some breathing room.

Neither overworked nor idle, yielding neither a glut nor a shortfall, I have gradually settled into a relaxed, unhurried rhythm with the land. It is a partnership of gentle mutual adaptation, where both farmer and soil shape one another over time.

● The current state beneath the ‘Number One’ manure net, now hosting herbs, tomatoes, loofah, marigolds, yellow beans, bitter melons, dandelions, malabar spinach, chrysanthemums, shiso, and pumpkins. Following the stretched twine, the climbers will gradually wind their way upwards, eventually weaving together into a little ‘forest of food’.

The space around me follows much the same principle.

Back to the opening question: “How much space does a person actually need?” Beyond the ten-plus-square-metre kang room and kitchen, the exterior of the barn nook features a dry toilet situated outside the west-facing window. The patch of ground beside it doubles as an open-air shower, adding roughly two square metres of concrete paving. Altogether—kang room, kitchen, external wall cabinet, dry toilet, open-air shower, plus the paved perimeter—it all fits comfortably within fifteen square metres.

● The open-air shower and dry toilet outside the west wall. The extra recess behind the toilet serves as the storage cabinet for the kang room.

A couple from Yunnan visited last year. They had once owned a sprawling compound with several rooms, yet they studied this little shed with particular interest: “For us, one space like this is more than enough.”

The earth turns through its cycles, seasons shift from bright to grey. The stove offers warmth to fend off frost and biting winds, and dryness to banish the lingering damp of the plum rains. These two modest barns, neither vast nor cramped, quietly hold everything life truly requires. Fifteen square metres. Body and mind at rest. Exactly where one ought to be.

● ‘Number One’ as it stands today. Compared to three years ago, a few changes stand out: first, weary of mosquitoes, I’ve fitted the windows with mesh screens; second, the star jasmine by the door has taken root and will form a proper arbour by next year; third, resting on the little table between the two tyre sofas are two freshly foraged termite mushrooms; fourth, this year’s harvest of garlic and onions hangs drying on the wall.

● The current exterior of ‘Number Two’, with firewood already stacked neatly against the wall.

Foodthink Contributor

Kouzi

Steadfast farmer and village brewmaster. Full-time food lover, part-time farmer, and amateur writer.

Unless otherwise noted, all images in this article are by the author.

Editor: Wang Hao