Finding your home away from home
This beautiful Ruby Springs prefab home should put to bed the claims that prefab homes are boring. This place is beautiful. And I love the customizations: rock fireplace and facade, roll up wall, cork flooring, solar power, and most of the woodwork is done with reclaimed Douglas fir.
View more at Medicine Hat Inc. (via Jetson Green)
I don’t love this home, but there are some bits that are really cool. Built in Tuscany, Italy, it’s self-sufficient for energy, thanks to solar panels, rainwater collection, and a heat pump. Being have embedded in rock has to help regulate temperatures, too.
The red staircase is very cool, and the way the rock face is just part of the wall in many of the rooms is interesting and fun. I’m not a big fan of the stark whiteness, but the design of the house is awesome.
View more at 1 Kind Design
This interesting bit of architecture is dubbed the “Black Teahouse”. Located in the Czech Republic, the Black Teahouse has as its key feature striking black exterior wood. How did they get the wood black? Why they burnt it, of course.
I don’t know how or why they burn the exterior wood, other than it looks great. It seems like it would be exceptionally hard to seal the wood, and it would rot quickly – at least here in the Pacific Northwest it would. Still, I love the wood details, and the small space wouldn’t be too hard to build.
View more at Homedsgn.com
Patrick Mets had always been fascinated by water towers, and as a child he even imagined living in one. Well, he finally got his wish when he moved his family into a decommissioned water tower near the Brussels Airport.
The living spaces were created in the old water containment area, and many of the old fixtures remain. The water tower is now how to a family of four plus two cats – what an interesting living choice. That’d be fun!
Read more at The New York Times
Well, I’m going to need one of these now.
View at Tempoperdue (via DigsDigs)
I don’t want to oversell this tree house. Calling it “the ultimate tree house” might give you expectations that exceed reality. But in this case… it won’t. This tree house is awesome. Just check out these pictures, and be amazed.
Built by German firm Baumraum in Munster, this tree house is called Froschkönig and is beautiful. I love the pond entrance, too.
View more at Freshome
In contrast to many of the cabins I post here on CabinZoom, this one is tiny, cheap, and rough. But it’s cheap. I’m a little unclear on the math, but it only cost a few thousand dollars, and that’s with all the challenges of building in the Hawaiian jungle, with the dense vegetation, earthquakes, and acid rain. The house is about 6 feet square and built up on stilts to survive the 300 inches of rain per year the area receives. Crazy. Or crazy like a fox? Probably just crazy.
Read more at TinyHouseBlog.com
Near the ancient village of Urgup, Turkey, is Hotel Yunak Evleri. This hotel is slightly more unique than others in the area, as among its 30 rooms it has six cave houses. What’s it like to stay in a cave room at Hotel Yunak Evleri? Reviews on TripAdvisor are awesome, with several travelers noting that the rooms stay cool despite the heat.
Why do I bring up this hotel? Maybe before digging your own cave dwelling, you should fly to Turkey and try this hotel out for a few nights! At least, that’ll be my excuse!
Read more at Yunak.com (via BlessThisStuff)
In 1994 Horrace Burges was living in Crossville, Tennessee and had a divine vision. No, God didn’t tell him to get out of Tennessee, he told him to build a tree house. In the last 17 years much has Horrace built? He’s currently at 10,000 square feet and 10 stories – the massive structure is mostly supported by a single tree and reaches 100 feet into the air!
A few years ago Horrace opened the treehouse to the public, and he now gets a few hundred visitors a week to come and marvel at the behemoth. I wonder if it’s up to code.
Ohmygod I love this. Clustered around a man-made canal on the Colorado River in Austin, Texas, The Lake Austin House is made up of a series of structures and inter-connected outdoor spaces along a 200-foot boardwalk. The bedrooms and study are all grouped in separate buildings, but all the buildings are sited to get the proper sun, wind, and views. This really is perfect.
Awesome. But someone should probably check out that extra-dimensional portal at the end of the hallway. That looks dangerous.
View more pics at Arch Daily
