Flooding and rising sea levels have accelerated the adoption of modern floating homes. Enabled by innovative materials and technology that allow familiar structures with proper height, floating public saunas in Seattle and entire floating cities in South Korea have become a reality.

Equipped with sustainable design from green roofs to self-generated power, many designs are future-proofed, factoring in inclement weather, and are hurricane- and flood-ready. 

One such project is Land on Water, a system for constructing floating buildings that aims to be more flexible and sustainable than traditional methods designed by Copenhagen-based firm MAST, along with support from Hubert Rhomberg and FRAGILE. 

Designed with recycled reinforced plastic, these flat-pack units are modular and can easily be cast about the globe.

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Wood has long been a mainstay in construction but wood in multi-storey buildings is less common. Projects like Timber House in Brooklyn, by The Brooklyn Home Company and MESH Architectures, challenge this by being a six-storey condo built from mass-timber. Mass timber is structurally engineered wood that is stronger-than-steel and fire-resistant. 

Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects (SHL) takes this further with Rocket & Tigerli, a proposed mixed-use development in Winterthur, Switzerland. Once completed in 2026, it will be the world’s tallest wooden residential building at 32 floors and 100m long.

Using a new system, the concrete core will be replaced with wood, resulting in the individual beam coming in at a lower weight. ⁠Apart from enabling building taller constructions, this ensures that the entire building process achieves a lower amount of embedded carbon.⁠

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3D printer may have lost some of its novelty but architecture made via 3D printing is significant from a sustainability point of view.

Much of the waste associated with new buildings results from a time-consuming and labour-intensive construction process, so architects are looking toward 3D-printed structures to optimise construction with minimal waste. 

That aside, 3D-printed designs enable curvy, textured forms while allowing architects to create high-precision architectural models from the proposal stage. 

On top of that, these designs can be easily replicated across the globe, creating a commercially viable, streamlined, and sustainable approach to architecture.  

One example is House Zero in Austin, designed in partnership between Lake|Flato Architects and Icon, a startup specialising in 3D printing robotics. Designed for net-zero energy, the handsome ranch-style house features 3D-printed walls, a thermally broken, robustly insulated envelope, and a rapid software-controlled construction process.

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The sustainable virtues of cork are well known. While this renewable and biodegradable material has long been used in interiors and continues to trend as a flooring choice, it's now braving the elements in the form of sustainable cladding. 

Prague-based architects Atelier SAD and interior designers Iveta Zachariášová clad this family home in the Czech Republic with Portuguese cork panels. Chosen for its weather-resistant and thermal benefits, the cork-clad house blends into the home's rustic countryside setting. 

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Expect more homes which are small in size but big in ambition, like these tiny homes by Ireland’s social enterprise Common Knowledge. 

It is named after the Gaelic word for a small cottage, a Tigín Tiny Home clocks in at 215 sq ft over two levels equipped with wheels.

To make sustainable and affordable living more accessible, Common Knowledge has partnered with the UK’s Margent Farm, which grows hemp in Cambridgeshire, to fit homes with hemp. Beyond that, the homes feature other sustainable materials like cork insulation and natural rubber linoleum flooring, and their simple designs can even be built by hand. 

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