UID Architects’ Stunning Pit House is an Underground Home Sheltered Within a Floating Cedar Box

Appearing to float above the landscape of Okayama, Japan, the Pit House was actually <a href="http://inhabitat.com/nyc/crazy-subterranean-portal-under-central-park-records-nycs-biggest-historical-moments/excavating-wilderness-jeff-kamuda-2/?extend=1" target="_blank">built by excavating</a> six spaces of earth. Accommodating the clients’ desire to create a home with a deep connection to the earth, <a href="http://www.maeda-inc.jp/" target="_blank">UID Architects</a> organized the entire house around a circular living room, creating several interior garden areas that serve as an extension of the landscape.

The cedar box encases the house and hovers above the sunken ground floor.

A concrete cylinder situated in the central area of the house acts as both visually and structurally dominant element.

The cylinder connects six types of floor levels. A staircase spirals around it, enclosing a circular bathroom and a storage closet.

The main idea of the project was to make the transition between the exterior and interior as seamless as possible.

“The concept is inevitably drawn from the request of the clients, and the context of the site. It becomes a subterranean room with little influence of the open air, and a relationship with the external surface of the earth”, state the architects.

The space seems to flow and gradually develop itself into different areas of the house.

Multiple branch-like columns support the cedar floating box.