Swedish architecture studio Wingårdhs designed a collection of five quaint suites for the Trakt Forest Hotel in Småland. Supported by five metal stilts, the suites allow the visitors to feel as if they’re chilling amongst the tree canopy! Designed to “put nature in focus”, the cabins are accompanied by a restaurant and sauna in the complex, and they’re all connected via narrow woodland paths.
Designer: Wingårdhs
“We wanted to keep the ground as untouched as possible and dig as little as possible, to make sure that the tree root systems – and everything else living in the area – would stay unharmed,” said Gert Wingårdh, partner at Wingårdhs. While building the cabins, the studio wanted to create minimal disturbance to the surrounding landscape, and hence they positioned the suites on steel columns placed on concrete plinths. The cabins were constructed using locally-grown wood.
The wooden cabins have been placed in a surreal circular arrangement, with a long ramp providing access to each one. The ramp directly leads to the living area within each cabin, which then widens to focus on a massive window that provides stunning views of the forest. The other end of the cabin features a bathroom, and a storage area, while the bedrooms are positioned more privately, and amped with a wood panel finishing colored in a dark shade of green.
An impressive skylight has been placed above the bed, which provides views of the tree canopy above, while a corner window provides further views of the surrounding forest .” All openings are placed to maximize the intake of nature. The one over the bed is key to make you feel the soothing sensation of watching tall pine trees sway in the wind. That, together with an intimate and frugal inside decor in chlorophyll green, strengthens the experience of being invisible in the middle of a deep Swedish forest,” said the studio. The exterior of the cabin is marked by vertical long planks of roughly-cut pine, which creates an intriguing connection with the trunks of the surrounding trees.
