Why not create a hotel that gives people a chance to experience nature amongst the tree-tops, while also providing a uniquely designed housing experience? Treehotel in Sweden offers a unique hotel experience: Treerooms with contemporary design in the middle of unspoiled nature.
Treehotel was inspired by the film ”The Tree Lover” by Jonas Selberg Augustsen. It’s a tale of three men from the city who want to go back to their roots by building a tree house together. “The Tree Lover” is a philosophic story about the significance of trees for us human beings.
Treehotel is located in Harads, near the Lule river, about 100 kilometers from Luleå airport. The village has a population of about 600 and features a restaurant, shop and guest house. When you arrive at Treehotel, you check in at Treehotel Guesthouse. Treehotel Guesthouse has an authentic 1930-50’s setting and offers a restaurant, bar, sauna and relaxation area, TV, and internet.
Then it’s just a short stroll through the beautiful nature to your Treeroom. The most striking part of Harads is its magnificent surroundings. From Treehotel’s rooms you get a fantastic view of the Lule River valley, miles of forest and the powerful river.
The story of Treehotel
Once upon a time, there was a vocational guidance counsellor, Kent Lindvall, and a nurse, Britta Jonsson-Lindvall. The two have known each other for forever and been together since they were very young, through happiness and strife. They are two seemingly ordinary Swedish Lapland locals who wanted to stay close to their roots and to create a livelihood in their home village.
However, they are unusual. Unusually creative, full of ideas and an inexhaustible will to take things further. They are themselves, genuine and simple people with the courage to try out their ideas and make their dreams come true. Maybe this is what has helped them succeed, they have met the right people at the right time and inspired the kind of confidence needed to get where they are today. Their success story is also a story of hard work and long periods without pay.
During their troubled years, it would’ve been difficult to imagine that Britta would one day be standing here in her dress and apron, cooking wild game patties for Crown Princess Victoria. Or that her husband Kent would be out in the world, talking about “the big idea” at prestigious conferences, when he wasn’t busy building the new ‘tree dining terrace’ eight metres up in a tree, whilst major foreign TV producers, magazines and celebrities from near and far, come to the trees in the forest of Harads.
How did this happen?
The couple was at a point in life where Kent had built a company providing international fishing trips. Britta had worked with a number of development projects, local, regional and international.
One of the development projects led to an old retirement home in their home village, that had been closed for many years, which they carefully restored and turned into a guesthouse, Britta’s Pensionat. The guesthouse was run with love and care but wasn’t generating much income. Something had to be done. Britta participated in a design training programme focused on form and function within the tourism industry. That’s where the idea of a design project was born.
One day, the then unknown filmmaker Jonas Selberg Augustsén, who has roots in the area, came to the guesthouse. Over one summer, he and his film crew worked on the film Trädälskaren (The Tree Lover) which became his breakthrough production. The crew spent a lot of time at the guesthouse, whilst the film and the treehouse around which it was centered, grew.
Designing a Tree
When the film had been completed, Britta thought it a shame that such a nice treehouse would just stand there in the forest and go to waste. Maybe it could be rented out? Together, Britta and Jonas made it an integral part of what the guesthouse had to offer and it instantly became popular. However, it was far away and it required a lot of maintenance work. What if design and tree rooms could be combined, closer to the guesthouse?
Around this time, Kent was on a fishing trip in Russia with a group of friends. These friends happened to be three of Sweden’s foremost architects – Bertil Harström, Thomas Sandell and Mårten Cyrén. Kent mentioned the idea of designer hotel rooms and this piqued the interest of the architects.
Before leaving Russia they agreed to design one room each, as friends working together, even though they were working for competing firms. Their friendly collaboration turned out to be very important for the Treehotel.
The Treerooms
It resulted in a UFO, a bird’s nest, a cabin, a mirror cube and a blue cone which changed colour to orange. These spectacular creations attracted a lot of attention. There were sceptics here and there but eventually many of them also came to land in the bird’s nest and its neighbouring rooms.
International press and designer aficionados from all over the world began coming to the Treehotel in large numbers. Today, the hotel has naturally earned a place on many bucket lists. It has attracted everyone, from international celebrities, designers and fashion magazines, to ordinary people wanting to experience something as unusual as staying in a treehouse. A childhood dream with a touch of luxury and flair.
The large Dragonfly conference building and The 7th room has been added to the list of popular rooms. The 7th Room is extraordinary in every sense of the word. Higher up, larger and more luxurious than any of the other rooms.
Unspoiled environment
- The Treerooms are build in the natural forest while hardly affecting the surroundings. The material and construction techniques make as little environmental impact as possible. The treerooms are build on live trees without destroying the tree and the hotel does not chop down any trees or damage nature while building. Mostly it uses local construction companies.
- The Treerooms have an eco outdoor wood floor, which doesn´t contain any chemical substances. The wood is heated to over 200 degrees, which triggers their intrinsic resistance to protect against destruction.
- The Treerooms all have good insulation and are warmed up by underfloor heating. The electricity is supplied locally from green hydroelectric power. And the lighting consists of low-energy LED-systems.
- Daily operations have minimal impact on nature as well. The Treerooms have no sewage system and when cleaning, we always use eco-friendly products.
- Each room has a modern, environmentally friendly combustion toilet where everything is incinerated at 600 °C. The toilets are completely odourless and powered by electricity.
- Bathrooms have water-efficient sinks with running water sufficient for washing hands, face and brushing teeth. All wastewater is collected in a container that is emptied daily. Showers are located in a separate building.
Today, Britta is happily retired, but she remains a co-owner of Treehotel. Britta’s Pensionat has been renamed the Treehotel Guesthouse. The restaurant has been taken to a new level and the range of activities offered is steadily growing. Kent, the other owners and a growing staff are taking Kent’s and Britta’s dream into the future.
Source: https://www.treehotel.se
