An enormous glittering inhabitable pine cone dangling from the majestic redwoods in Alameda, California could be transplanted to your very own backyard. Built by Dustin Fieder of O2 Treehouse, this highly unusual structure is equal parts sculptural wonder and enchanting getaway with its faceted glass exterior taking inspiration directly from its environment. The Pinecone Treehouse spent much of the last year available as an AirBnb rental, and now it’s up for sale.

Reachable by a ladder that stretches down to the ground, the Pinecone Treehouse features a spacious bed chamber inside and comes complete with a handcrafted indoor/outdoor bathroom connected to the treehouse by a wooden catwalk. Feider’s previous experience building geodesic treehouses clearly came in handy for this project, which takes a similar approach with a few tweaks to produce a classic pine cone shape.

In fact, the Pinecone Treehouse is just the latest of some 40-odd treehouses produced by Feider’s company. O2 Treehouse is known for its dazzling handcrafted structures, including a platform high up in the crowns of the trees in Geyserville, California and a geodesic structure set closer to the ground, built for Robby Krieger, guitarist for The Doors.

Fieder says he started O2 Treehouse “with the intention to inspire people to reconsider how we can more harmlessly co-exist with nature.”

“The Pinecone Treehouse is a space created to tap into your higher self, a space to rediscover your inner calm,” reads the AirBnb listing for the structure. “Cradled by those living giants the California Redwoods, one is invited to live in the vision of their dreams to quiet the mind until they can hear their inner truths, to reestablish a connection with nature and self.”

If you’re interested in making the Pinecone your own, rumor has it that the structure starts at $150,000 plus transport and installation fees that will vary depending on where you live. You can request more info at the O2 Treehouse website.

Encircling a 100-year-old oak – the tallest tree on the Château de Raray hotel property in France – the ORIGIN tree house by Atelier Lavit is envisioned as a tailored wooden ‘dress’ to make the oak stand out even more. This modern timber pod functions as a tree house hotel room, providing surprisingly spacious and comfortable lodgings accessed from a hanging bridge. Each facet of the geometric structure intersects the other, creating dynamic overlapping lines.

The effect is that of an abstracted bird’s nest – which is exactly what the architects were going for. “The design of the cabin, coupled with the construction techniques, led to a rationalization of the assembly logic of the branches collected by the birds to create their impregnable shelters,” they explain.

Measuring just under 250 square feet, the room includes a small sheltered patio from which the interiors are entered. Keep climbing the ladder set beside the tree’s trunk instead, and you’ll find yourself on the tree house’s rooftop terrace. Inside, the tree house is lined in pale wood with matching custom furniture. Guests enjoy a generously-sized bed looking out a large operable window to the branches beyond the glass. The room also includes a sitting area and a private bathroom.

Atelier Lavit recently took this same aesthetic in a different direction with a floating eco-hotel on a lake near Avignon, France. The series of buoyant suites on Lac de la Lionne are enveloped in criss-crossing timber slats, creating a semi-private outdoor area complete with a hot tub, while the beds inside are placed directly beneath skylights for a view of the stars.

Despite sharing a tiny footprint of land with other guests at this Chinese hotel, you can practically forget anyone else exists altogether thanks to a clever stacked arrangement that points each level in a different direction. Step out onto your private balcony – located on the roof of the room below – and look out onto the peaceful forest of rural Huang Shan, Anhui Province, China. Designed by Shanghai-based architecture firm Bengo Studio, the Qinyushan Tree House is a beautiful use of space.

A spiral staircase runs up through the center of the hotel, which includes two guest rooms, two bathrooms, one living room, and a ‘landscape room’ located at the top of the building. Each room has its own roof access with a glass railing to avoid interrupting views of the trees.

Elevated off the forest floor, the hotel features curvy volumes fanning out in different directions from the central core, capped on each cantilevered end by floor-to-ceiling windows. Guests ascend an enclosed glass hallway to either walk down into the lowest bedroom and bathroom, or ascend to the upper levels.

Its vertical wooden cladding helps it blend into its natural environment, and the minimalist design is an interesting take on modern treehouse-inspired structures.

Looking like something out of a creepy fairytale, this little black house hovers in the air beneath the arch of an old railway bridge, a spindly ladder reaching down into the fallen leaves. If you weren’t expecting it to be there and happened upon it while on a walk, you might be a bit shocked to see it seemingly floating in space, its skylights glinting in the sun. From far away, you can’t see how it could possibly be supported, lending it a somewhat supernatural appearance.

The steel cables that support the structure become apparent as you walk up, and the ladder is usually hidden off to one side, requiring passersby to look around a bit for a way to get up.

But if you did happen to be brave enough to approach it and climb the ladder, not knowing what you’d find inside, you’d be greeted with a bare-bones but cozy hut from which to survey the surrounding woods, complete with a loft and a wood stove.

Set in an area that’s 15 minutes walking distance fro the city center of Pardubice, Czech Republic, the installation takes advantage of stark scenery left behind by disused infrastructure, aiming for the feel of a mysterious military complex.

Created by H3T Architekti and photographed by Maritna Kubesova and Tomas Rasl, ‘Flying Black House’ is a temporary installation daring passersby to give in to their curiosity, even if it makes them feel like the foolish protagonist in a horror movie.

Supported by nothing but skinny poles, delicately balancing or tethered as if they might float away, these precarious-seeming houses laugh in the face of gravity. Cantilevering architectural volumes off cliffsides or elevating them well above ground level gives modern residences incredible views of their surroundings, whether they’re located on a mountain overlooking the sea or in the middle of a busy Japanese city.

Snohetta Treehotel, Sweden

Architecture firm Snøhetta has completed their addition to Sweden’s Treehotel, a hovering cabin that appears at first glance to be supported by no more than the staircase leading up to it. The design is based on a traditional Nordic cabin with a wood facade clad in charred boards of pine for a look that contrasts with the snow below, making the structure look heavy and solid to enhance its gravity-defying properties.

Tower House Inspired by Observatories

Tucked into the woods of upstate New York, GLUCK+’s Tower House takes inspiration from observatories for its mostly-vertical form. A bright yellow staircase is visible from outside through the glass envelope of the supporting tower, and the upper volume is topped with a terrace.

House in Yatsugatake Mountains by Kidosaki Architects, Japan

Jutting out over a cliff at the foot of Japan’s Yatsugatake Mountains, this home by Kidosaki Architects Studio expands horizontally out into midair to enhance views of the natural landscape through floor-to-ceiling glazing on three sides. The cantilevered portion of the home is supported by two diagonal steel cylinders.

Cargo Container Office Sticks Out Beyond Edge of Hill

Architect Patrick Bradley repurposed a 45-foot cargo container into an office for himself, allowing a third of it to hang out over the edge of the hilly plot as a sort of floating balcony encased in glass. The project makes very few structural changes in the container itself, staying true to its original form while modernizing its exterior.

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