Situated deep in the forest amongst Ozarkian cave entrances and abandoned mine shafts, the over/under house is inspired by the site’s history and the interplay between the subterranean and the superterranean.

Much like Calvino’s Eusapia from Invisible Cities, the design seeks to disassociate the threshold between the underworld and the overworld, of time and timelessness. This notion expresses itself through the home’s geometry and siting, and is reinforced by its materiality. A continuous horizontal datum slices through the layout, mineshaft-like, guiding the inhabitant back and forth from a perch in the tree canopy to spaces buried into the hillside. In this way the protagonist glides seamlessly between the underworld, overworld, and sky

SPECS: 6,900 s.f. single family