OAKLAND — A year and a half after it opened, a unique tiny home community wants to double its capacity — installing a second village of psychedelic, mural-covered homes for unhoused young people.

Youth Spirit Artworks, an East Bay nonprofit that hosts art and job training programs for homeless and low-income youth, opened its first tiny home village near the Oakland Coliseum early last year. Now the organization is planning to add another 21 tiny homes to the same property, using experimental designs that they hope will be replicated across Oakland.

The organization still needs to raise more funding and get approval from the city. But Youth Spirit Artworks executive director Sally Hindman said her nonprofit is working closely with city officials on the design, and many of those who donated to the first village are eager to contribute again. She hopes to break ground on the project’s first phase — a community center and a space for creative projects — next month.

“I think everybody’s desperate to find innovative solutions to the challenges of homelessness,” Hindman said, “and we did something that was wildly successful, so people see it as replicable and as moving us in a direction that people want to see these projects go.”

Hindman is working with University of San Francisco’s architecture department, a student-run sustainable housing club at UC Berkeley, and many other volunteers to get the project off the ground. The plan is to build three micro-villages of eight modular units each, for seven residents and one resident assistant. Hindman hopes that building smaller villages will allow the model to be replicated on small vacant lots throughout Oakland, which may not have the capacity for a large-scale project.

The organization still needs to raise most of the $2 million price tag for its new village. Though it has requested $250,000 from the city, it so far hasn’t been successful in obtaining that funding. But the program has some support from city officials, and Hindman anticipates a new village might open by fall 2023 at the earliest.

“Councilmember Reid is very supportive of Youth Spirit Artworks and their tiny home village as this organization seeks to remedy our current housing crisis and how it has affected our transitional age youth here in Oakland and the greater SF Bay Area,” Oraya Hunter, communications director for Councilmember Treva Reid’s office, said in an email.

As in the first tiny home village, young people ages 18-24 may stay there for up to two years, ideally while working on school, job training and trying to find permanent housing. A year and a half in, the first village has moved six residents into permanent housing. Three have gone to stay with family. Two people were asked to leave the program because they violated the rules — including one resident who was getting into fights — and two others decided to leave (one after getting incarcerated). It’s a difficult population to serve — at least half of the residents have serious mental health challenges, and many need to learn basic life skills they were never taught growing up, Hindman said.

Tiny homes have become increasingly popular as the Bay Area grapples with an escalating homelessness crisis, because they offer privacy and dignity that’s lacking from traditional dorm-style shelters. Oakland and San Jose both have embraced the concept, and have opened more than a dozen tiny home sites in all.

Youth Spirit Artworks puts a new spin on this trend by trying to fill what it sees as a major lack of resources for young people. Because county housing systems prioritize elderly, ill and disabled people for placements, most tiny home villages primary shelter older people.

And while other tiny home sites are industrial-looking, featuring uniform units in drab colors, YSA’s site is an explosion of color. Murals cover every surface, from the homes themselves, to the planter boxes, to the fence surrounding the property. Inside, the tiny homes look like funky college dorms, with bright colors on the walls, fun quilts and donated decorations.

“We raised the bar on beauty, and who deserves beauty,” Hindman said.

The YSA site also bucks the traditional model because it was designed and built by thousands of volunteers — including some of the young people now living there. A leadership council of young residents helps handle any conflicts that arise on the site, plan programs and run events.

Delilah Aviles, 21, had been couch surfing, sleeping in her car in Oakland and camping in the North Bay before she made her way to the YSA village. After fleeing a violent housing situation as a teenager, Aviles found herself without a stable home. She managed to graduate high school, but dropped out of college after one semester — it was just too hard to attend classes while also worrying about where she would stay.

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“We’re kind of regenerating ourselves here,” she said. “Trying to find ways that we can be self-sustainable.”

But Aviles’ time in the program is running out — her two years will be up in February. Aviles said she’s applied to about 10 housing programs, but hasn’t found one that will take her. She’s not sure if she’ll be able to find permanent housing in time — a common worry among her fellow residents.

“A lot of us aren’t sure,” she said.

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