Subterra Castle (Kansas)
Ed Peden and his wife Dianna Peden decided to go all out with transforming a nuclear bunker from the 1950s into a two-story-family home. This underground missile launch complex lies about 25 miles outside of Topeka, Kansas. However, it is nothing you would expect a doomsday bunker to look like on the inside.
Instead, it is a luxurious and charming 11,000 square-foot residence that has a solar greenhouse, rustic woods, natural fibers, a state-of-the-art kitchen, stained glass, a new-age ambiance, and cozy home vibes with much more.
The Paper House (Massachusetts)
There is nothing more peculiar than the idea of creating a house entirely out of newspapers, including not just walls but for furniture and fireplace too. It is all newspapers except for one thing: the roof, as it has shingles instead.
The house was built in 1922 by Elis F. Stenman as a summer home, and he was the same mechanical engineer who designed the paper clip-making machines. It took him about 20 years and 100,000 rolled newspapers to make this two-room dream home, including a newspaper-made grandfather clock.
The Twisted House (Indiana)
Well, what is a house that is not made out of wood and is twisty such that its roof seems to touch the ground! McNaughton, the architect of this life-sized fairytale house, taught woodworking for 35 years at the University of Southern Indiana and created this artwork as an interactive sculpture that engages the viewer’s imagination.
Located at the Indianapolis Art Center, the house was crafted in 2015 from cedarwood, including the flowers on the windowsill. But that is not even the most exciting part, knowing that you can walk into this twisted house like any other simple house. The glass on the five windows allows the visitors to peer out further and look at the surrounding woods.
The Smith Mansion (Wyoming)
Not only is this house weird, unfinished, and unusual, but it also features a tragic story that has left it to sit abandoned today along the Buffalo Bill Scenic Byway. Francis Lee Smith was an engineer who began building this crazy mansion as his pet project using not brick but logs from the rattlesnake mountain.
The project was initially designed without any architectural blueprint or definite plan, taking him 12 years to build this 5-story house with a bumpy slide staircase, unfinished rooms, balconies, and more. However, due to time and money spent on this house, Francis’ wife divorced him. He later fell to death as he worked on the balcony amid strong winds, leaving the place abandoned to date.
Conclusion
For a piece of architecture to be amazing does not require it to be the world’s tallest building or for it to be designed by world-class architects. Instead, all it takes to make an eye-catching and weirdly impressive archetype is a creative and curious mind. Modern architecture continues to take everyone by surprise as the classics do, and it will be interesting to see how the list of these more than livable structures turn out in the coming decade or so.