Hotel

Commissioned to design a sustainable floating hotel, Margot Krasojević Architects produces a proposal that's unconstrained by practicalities. The designer envisions making use of the massive amounts of plastic in the ocean as a building material.

Hired to breathe new life into a drab 1970s hotel, Sou Fujimoto Architects decided on an out-of-the-box approach that involved renovating the aging space, while also adding an eye-catching new building that takes the form of a grass-covered hill.

Qatar isn't lacking in notable architecture but a new floating hotel would be a head-turning addition to the country. Named the Eco-Floating Hotel, it would rotate in place like a revolving restaurant and boast wind, solar, and tidal sustainability.

Foster + Partners has created another hotel for the ambitious Red Sea Project in Saudi Arabia. Southern Dunes will get electricity from a huge 1.2-gigawatt battery system and is designed to withstand the harsh conditions in the Arabian dunes.

Thin is in when it comes to skyscraper design, with skinny luxury towers increasingly seen as viable in crowded cities. However, the Pencil Tower Hotel makes other thin towers look chunky as it will measure just 6.4 meters in width.

Influential French architect Jean Nouvel has produced several impressive buildings in the Middle East, but his latest project may be his most ambitious. Sharaan consists of a resort and hotel built into sandstone mountains in the Arabian desert.

ZJA drew on a lost coastal dune landscape for inspiration with its mixed-use hotel and casino in Middelkerke, Belgium. The project will overlook the North Sea and is envisioned as an artificial sand dune, with a "boulder-like" hotel on top.

It's a tough time to launch a new hotel and you could be forgiven for wondering if the Atari Hotels line would be quietly dropped. Instead it continues to build momentum, with Gensler now involved and some renders of a hotel in Las Vegas revealed.

Recycled shipping containers have been used to create a new hotel and office building in California. The container hotel rooms feature an unusual design centered around a raised roof area that's meant to improve space, ventilation, and light inside.

Dubai is chock-full of impressive buildings, including the world's tallest, but even in that company the Opus stands out. Designed by Zaha Hadid Architects, this luxury hotel takes the form of a glass cube with an eight-story void at its center.

Architectural studio Alexis Dornier has recently completed a tropical treehouse escape dubbed Lift that's located in Penestanan, on the outskirts of Ubud, Bali. Guests can sleep amid the treetops in a luxurious eco-structure.

When people think of Atari, most probably think of its classic video games, or maybe even its upcoming Atari VCS console, but perhaps we'll soon be able to add hotels to the list too. It has agreed to lend its name to a new line of hotels in the USA.