Krystall Hotel: Waterstudio's Floating Snowflake for the Northern Lights

A six-pointed glass snowflake, 120 metres across, floating in a Norwegian fjord under the northern lights: that was the Krystall hotel, a five-star floating resort designed by the Dutch architect Koen Olthuis of Waterstudio and announced in August 2014 for the waters off Tromsø.

The Krystall hotel design: a floating ice crystal

Waterstudio drew the hotel in the shape of a six-pointed ice crystal. Olthuis said the form was meant to blend in with the "winter environment" between the fjords. The plan called for 86 guest rooms, conference rooms and a spa and wellness centre, all on a single floating platform 120 metres in diameter.

The interiors carried the winter theme indoors. Olthuis described hallways lined with blue, futuristic shapes, a fireplace built from transparent bricks that look like blocks of ice, and minimalist rooms with wintry details.

Northern lights from your bed

The whole building was conceived around the aurora. Waterstudio's stated design goal was a simple glass building that gives guests the widest possible view of the northern lights from their beds, and a glass roof was central to the plan. "The Northern Light is the main feature for the hotel," Olthuis told Dezeen.

The promise was obvious to anyone who has waited for the aurora in deep frost: the same green curtains, seen from a warm room.

Floating real estate: how it was meant to work

The developer was Dutch Docklands, a company that builds only floating developments, working with a group of Norwegian entrepreneurs. Krystall was presented as a cold-climate sister to the company's Greenstar floating hotel project in the Maldives.

• Construction: the hotel would be built in sections in dry docks and assembled on site.
• Stability: a large floating base would do most of the work, helped by dampers, springs and cables to reduce movement.
• Access: with no connection to land, guests and supplies would arrive by boat.
• Footprint: Olthuis called it a "scarless development", since the structure could be removed without leaving a lasting mark.

"Different to any vessel, this hotel is floating real estate and will not move," Olthuis said. The exact site near Tromsø was to stay secret until an environmental impact assessment was complete. The 2014 announcement gave an opening date of December 2016, and the developers estimated that floating construction would cost about 15 per cent more than an equivalent hotel on land.

Seeing the northern lights in Tromsø

Tromsø is a natural choice for an aurora hotel. Visit Tromsø says the lights can usually be seen in the region from late August to early April, whenever the sky is dark enough, and organised tours run from September to early April.

On clear nights the aurora is often visible from the city itself, especially from darker spots such as the lake at Prestvannet. When cloud covers the coast, guided tours drive inland or along the fjords in search of clear skies. Book these ahead in the busiest winter months, as popular tours sell out. For more on the city itself, read our guide to Tromsø in winter, and for another piece of outdoor design see the solar-tent concept.

Related reading

• Kwon O Chul’s Yellowknife Aurora Gallery
• Ten Northern-Lights Regions: Geography, Darkness and Realistic Expectations
• The Arctic Light: Lofoten’s Long Spring Twilight
• Aurora from Norway, Alaska and Orbit

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