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Floating House Arsitektur Hunian by Oliver Schutte

Floating House Arsitektur Hunian by Oliver Schutte is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2026 A' Design Award Perak in Desain Produk Berkelanjutan, Proyek dan Desain Hijau Competition Category.


PerakProduk Berkelanjutan· 2026

Floating House Arsitektur Hunian

by Oliver Schutte

A' Design Award Perak Winner in Produk Berkelanjutan Category

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The Design

About Floating House Arsitektur Hunian

Floating House adalah rumah tiga lantai yang terletak di Lembah Tengah Kosta Rika. Bangunan ini memiliki luas sekitar 400 meter persegi dan didirikan pada lahan lereng perbukitan. Strategi desain pasif menjadi panduan proyek ini, termasuk penempatan yang spesifik terhadap tapak serta pemanfaatan sumber daya alam. Teknik konstruksi industrial dan prafabrikasi dikombinasikan dengan material regeneratif yang dipanen secara lokal. Tritisan atap yang lebar melindungi ruang-ruang di bawahnya dari hujan dan radiasi matahari. Energi surya dikumpulkan di atap. Taman berundak dan balkon menghadap ke lanskap sekitarnya.

The Recognition

About the A' Design Award Perak

Floating House Arsitektur Hunian adalah pemenang A' Design Award Perak, pengakuan yang sangat bergengsi yang diberikan kepada desain kelas atas yang indah dan mengesankan. Pemenang Perak adalah karya yang sangat cemerlang dan sangat kreatif yang menggambarkan keahlian, bakat, dan ketajaman luar biasa para desainernya. Floating House Arsitektur Hunian diharapkan menjadi karya yang menakjubkan, etalase keahlian, sangat profesional, dan sangat inovatif. Desain pemenang A' Design Award Perak ini adalah penemuan yang sangat menonjol dan dikagumi yang bermanfaat bagi dan memajukan batas-batas seni, sains, desain, dan teknologi. Floating House Arsitektur Hunian adalah kreasi yang sangat dicemburui yang membangkitkan keinginan, membawa perasaan positif, dan memercikkan keheranan dan kekaguman.

Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties
The Floating House is located in the Central Valley of Costa Rica, which houses the Greater Metropolitan Area with about sixty percent of the national population. In this context, the project creates a suburban oasis on a beautiful hillside location. Hanging gardens and balconies provide the home owners with spectacular views of the surrounding landscape, while large roof overhangs protect the individual spaces from rainwater and solar radiation. Solar energy is harvested on top of the roof.
Dimensions & Packaging
The three-level building measures about 400 square meters in total. Floating light-frame structures are contrasted by service areas that are built onto the sloping terrain. Social spaces in the center of the house are opening up to the surrounding gardens of the property. The project is based on passive design strategies such as site-specific positioning and the use of natural resources. Industrial building techniques are combined with locally harvested and regenerative construction materials.
Tags
Architecture, Bioclimatic, Climate, Cocreation, Design, Development, Modularity, Prefabrication, Sustainability, Regeneration, Residential, Tropical, Zero emission, Zero footprint
Production Technology
The Floating House combines prefabricated and local building techniques. Its ground floor transitions from a sloped site condition to the terraced building geometry. Private rooms at the top float above a sandwiched garden level, resulting in three different conditions that are vertically stacked on top of each other. Large glass doors and sliding walls are designed to dynamically moderate the relationship among interior and exterior spaces, according to the necessities of rainy or dry season.
Design Challenge
The main challenge of the No Footprint House series, including the Floating House as an expression of its ongoing material development progress, is to unite a broad variety of entities in a joined multistakeholder approach. Such broadness and systemic thinking are required to find solutions for some of the greatest challenges of our time, which includes the lowering and leveling of emissions in all sectors that significantly contribute environmental contamination.
Research
Costa Rica has shifted from a strategy of sustainability to regenerative development. In this context, the ongoing No Footprint House series, the NFH project, drives innovation through the development and incorporation of renewable and locally sourced building materials in combination with passive design strategies and local energy production. The project is optimized through industrial and prefabricated building techniques, the first of its kind in Central America.
Inspiration
The Floating House is inspired by its surrounding landscape and the local tropical climate. A series of interrelated volumes and outside spaces are placed according to the logic of the target site. Ample roof overhangs follow the sloped site condition, protecting all spaces below while revealing spectacular views onto the Costa Rican capital San Jose. Interior rooms merge with their surrounding exterior gardens, creating a balanced and harmonic relationship of nature and the built environment.
Project Duration
The actual duration of each project from the NFH series depends on the specific building size and its respective location. Beyond the building of individual homes, the NFH framework engages in strategies of sustainability and regenerative development. This includes, for example, topics like reforestation, the creation of food forests, permaculture, local energy production and a continuous life cycle improvement. The duration of these aspects can be described as ongoing and potentially endless.
Operation Flow
The Floating House is designed according to the principles of bioclimatic architecture and passive design strategies. Industrial building techniques combine with locally harvested and regenerative construction materials. The project is based on the research of the No Footprint House, a modular building system that allows for a broad variety of residential typologies. The larger project framework engages with academia and industry to cocreate sustainable and regenerative building solutions.
Patents
Copyrights to all building and interior designs belong to A-01 (A Company / A Foundation)
Image Credits
A-01 / Garcia Lachner

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