4 isolated self-builds from around the world

In need of a little escapism? These homes, featured in new book Living on Vacation, take the idea of isolation from the outside world to a whole other level.  

You may be stuck indoors, holidays for the year cancelled, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do a little bit of armchair travelling. Living on Vacation: Contemporary Houses for Tranquil Living is a brand new title, published by Phaidon on 17th April, £29.95, which offers you the chance to see some incredible homes from the most beautiful places around the world.

The Grand Designs magazine team had a sneak peek ahead of the launch of the book, and picked some of their favourite homes, each set in splendid isolation of a unique natural landscape.

Writer’s House, Norway, Kolman Boye

Located on an archipelago of around 6,500 islands, islets, and reefs just south of the Arctic Circle in northern Norway, this project borrows stylistic cues from Norwegian coastal huts known as Naust.

The building crouches on low stilts above the rocky ground, with one of the two hut-like buildings higher up the slope than the other. The path leading to the home sits inside a small trench, giving the appearance that the structure is completely cut off from the outside world on his rocky outcrop.

Island Retreat, New Zealand, Fearon Hay

Waiheke is an island paradise just 45 minutes by ferry away from Auckland, New Zealand. This Island Retreat by Fearon Hay architects is formed of 3 separate dwellings around a courtyard – two for sleeping and living, and the third functioning as a studio.

The choice of concrete and steel as materials keep the aesthetic comfortably utilitarian rather than luxurious. Inside, concrete walls and floors continue the spare, unadorned feel. Totally off-grid, the house powers itself with solar energy, harvests rainwater, and recycles wastewater.

Árborg House, Iceland, PKdM Arkitektar

This weekend retreat overlooks a bend in the Hvítá, a river in Iceland which in springtime carries icebergs down to the sea, 60 miles away.

The exterior of Árborg House is a made up of concrete blended with gravel from the riverbed, giving it the appearance of just-cooled lava, while moss excavated from the site was carefully moved, sustained, and then reused to add a soft, green, bulky layer to the roof.

All this roots the home sensitively within this epic landscape.

Glass Pavilion, Spain, OFIS Architects

In Andalusia’s remote Gorafe desert, this extraordinary little retreat is a place to disconnect completely and discover what solitude really means.

Designed by Slovenian studio OFIS Arhitekti, the Glass Pavilion began as a research project that aimed to prove that glass can be used as a fully structural element, but the residence is available as a holiday rental, where visitors can lie back to watch shooting stars streak through a night sky unspoiled by light pollution.