Tag Archives: Thilina Liyanage

This rock and bamboo beach cabin gives us some serious glamping goals

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Bio-architect Thilina Liyanage just revealed plans for the Bali Rock House – a rather elvish-looking conceptual beach house with pointed roofs that draw equal inspiration from Thai architecture styles as well as medieval imaginary ‘gnomish’ homes. The Bai Rock House features a multi-storeyed construction with an open living space on the lower floor, a terrace on the absolute top, and a rather quaint bedroom in between.

The Bali Rock House is a mixture of multiple styles, but it sticks true to Liyanage’s organic approach and sheer avoidance of straight lines and concrete as a construction material. While the Sri Lanka-based architect often relies on materials like bamboo and wood to bring his ideas to life, the Bali Rock House (as its name rather aptly suggests) sits on a sturdy set of rock arches. The rest of the house uses bamboo and wood, although the rock foundation captures the eyes with its dominating presence.

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

The Bali Rock House falls square within the term ‘glamping’, or glamorous camping. Its unique format allows it to be a private residence (a holiday home away from home) or even modular set of houses dotted across a coastline as a part of a luxury resort.

Liyanage made it fairly certain that the Bali Rock House isn’t the kind you could get any sort of work done in! The property is located on a beachside, with its own private entrance into the waters. The lower level has ample lounging areas (with a swing too), while upper level has a deck/balcony that emerges out of the bedroom. If you want a more elevated view of your surroundings, Liyanage even gave the rock house a terrace of its own, perfect for some evening-time yoga!

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These Mushroom-shaped duplex villas with their own swimming pool offer the ultimate glamping experience

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There’s a lot of room in this mush-room…

With a living/recreation room on the lower floor, your private bedroom on the upper floor, a patio beyond the threshold, and an attached swimming pool just off the premises, the Mushroom Villa is a wonderfully idyllic holiday home that gives you a cozy space to unwind in. Located right in the midst of nature, the villa is made entirely from bamboo (one of architect Thilina Liyanage’s signature materials) with terracotta tiles on the roof to keep you cool during the days. Practically cut off from civilization, the villa’s roofs also come dotted with solar panels that help power your glamping experience!

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

The Mushroom Villa is a duplex stay with a living room, patio, bedroom, and a balcony attached to the bedroom. A mushroom-cap-shaped roof on top comes with 14 solar panels that power the villa. An attic exists right above the bedroom ceiling and the mushroom roof, although it isn’t entirely clear whether that space is usable or accessible. Alternatively, one could imagine that’s where the generator/battery and water tank are located.

Designed to comfortably house 2 people, although a child or pet can be included too, the Mushroom Villa stands on a wooden deck, with a swimming pool built into the front half of the platform. There’s ample lighting within and around the villa including on the pool floor too, so you can comfortably enjoy your serene life post-sunset too!

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Breathtaking forest observation deck is designed to look like a massive moose head

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With the moose’s antlers providing the perfect platform for people to perch on as they safely observe nature, Thilina Liyanage’s Alaska Moose Observation Deck is a wonderful example of nature-inspired design at its best.

Liyanage is no stranger to biomimicry and design. The Sri Lankan designer has worked extensively on architectural projects that directly and indirectly interpret natural cues. The Alaska Moose Observation Deck assumes the shape of a moose-head, with the face providing a unique facade that has a staircase within it, leading up to the two elevated decks. The decks sit atop the moose’s horns, offering a stunning view of the forest up ahead, while at the same time being an incredibly eye-catching and iconic piece of architecture even when viewed down from below.

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

Liyanage’s creation, like a lot of his past work, relies predominantly on wood. The wood provides the perfect set of physical properties for his organic designs. It’s easy to mold, curve, sand, finish, and join together to create any curvilinear shape. If treated and polished well, it also provides a wonderful natural finish to your final design without needing any coating of paint.

The split observation deck is accessible by a single staircase that forks in two at the end. While the overall design doesn’t look pretty stable, it’s held in place by a set of cables that pin it to the ground like a massive tent. Big enough to comfortably hold 10 people on each side, the deck offers a stellar, panoramic view of the forest it’s situated in… and even comes with lights that glow as the sun sets, turning the observation deck into a massive art installation!

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Awe-striking Wildlife Observation Decks are designed to look like massive wooden deer

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Using a combination of hardwood and bamboo, Thilina Liyanage’s observation deck for Yala National Park in Sri Lanka assumes the shape of a grazing deer, with its majestic form looking larger than life. The deer, complete even with antlers, bend downwards to allow their long necks and antlers to act as staircases. Climb up and you’re treated to a 15ft. high stunning view of the Yala National Park, home to Sri Lankan Elephants, Sri Lankan Leopards, and a host of other wild animals and aquatic birds.

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

The observation decks are well in line with Liyanage’s nature-inspired design ethos. Previously having designed a yacht club in the shape of a manta ray and a beach shack in the shape of a goldfish, Liyanage looks again to an indigenous animal for his observation deck. The national park, located on the southern coast of Sri Lanka, is home to the Sambar deer – a large deer with antlers that proved to be the ideal choice for Liyanage. The decks are modeled on the deer’s graceful form, with a solid wooden structure that’s then overlaid with a low-poly mesh-inspired clad which provides the deer’s details and features. The deck features a split staircase that unites at a landing right above the deer’s head. From then, it’s a single staircase that leads to a dual-platform deck that’s big enough for roughly 10 people… although I wouldn’t recommend those kinds of loads on a wooden structure!

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This bamboo glamping cabin located on a babbling brook has the most picturesque views!

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Designed by Sri Lankan architect Thilina Liyanage, the Glamping River Cabin is located in the middle of a lush forest, right above a babbling brook so you get to sleep to the sound of flowing water and wake up to the sun peeking through the trees!

The Glamping Cabin lets you camp in the absolute lap of nature. It isn’t over-the-top luxurious, but it definitely has the best view nature can offer, along with all the free fish you can catch! The cabin takes on an organic shape of a lotus bud (Liyanage’s work definitely leans heavily on bio-inspiration), and has space for a bed on the inside, with open slits in the wall for air and light to come through. Step out and the cabin has its own deck with two chairs and a coffee table, offering the most serene lounging space for a couple of miles!

The river cabin, as its name suggests, is located right in the center of a brook that cuts through the forest. Built on a stone platform, it stays elevated above the water, enough to keep the floor cool without water rushing in. To access the cabin, one needs to cross a wooden bridge.

Liyanage’s cabin exists in two avatars. The overall structure is made from bamboo, while it has the option of being clad either in a translucent fabric or thick hay, letting you choose your privacy level as well as the amount of shade the inside of the cabin gets.

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Elevated cabin in the woods uses the space underneath it to create a neat sheltered patio!

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Taking visual cues from a woodpecker’s head with its prominent beak and pointy crest, the Woodpecker Forest Cabin is a concept abode from the mind of Thilina Liyanage, a Sri Lankan architect with a flair for nature-inspired architecture.

The Woodpecker Forest Cabin is a modern residential unit with an edgy low-poly design that proves a stark contrast against its natural, organic background. To make this contrast even more apparent, Liyanage deviates from his preferred use of bamboo and wood, opting for an all-metal build with girders connected together and patched with corrugated metal roofing. The cabin’s low poly design also has a vibrant pop of color, sporting a white base and a red crest, much like the Pileated Woodpecker it was inspired by.

The cabin is a beautiful two-floored unit with a small balcony on the upper floor that provides an elevated view of the forest. Large glass windows also ensure that the cabin’s interiors get enough light during the day while also letting you experience the forest’s grandeur to its fullest. However, the Woodpecker Forest Cabin’s most delightful feature is the sheltered patio that sits right under the stilted cabin. A perfect place to lounge during the day, host campfires during the night, or even park your car, this patio enhances the cabin’s ability to let you truly reconnect with nature.

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

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These bamboo villas curve into lotus flowers creating a Disney-worthy villa!

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Known for creating 3D visualizations of architectural residences that shake up the thrillseeker in each of us, graphic designer Thilina Liyanage has conceptualized a subdued bamboo retreat for when the adventurer grows tired. Taking inspiration from lotus flowers and magical realism, Liyanage’s Hideout Lotus Bamboo Villa rises above the ground on bamboo pillars to form a raised, single-story home resembling the look of a giant rattan table with an intricate, interwoven bamboo lotus mounted on top.

From an exterior perspective, the Hideout Lotus finds a common outdoor area just below its mounted single-level lotus-inspired living area. Four curved bamboo pillars stack atop one another to create borders around the common area, creating a tiered walking space that contains the villa’s canopied deck. Wooden panels line the deck, complimenting the rest of the bamboo structure, where globular concrete mounds harness the villa’s main support beams.

Three wide bamboo shafts elevate Hideout Lotus’s upper deck, which supports the villa’s main interior living area. In a congruent style with the ground deck, the upper deck fashions wooden panels for its flooring, which merge with the villa’s more intricate bamboo lacework. Like a lotus flower floating in a pond, the main villa casually rests on the upper deck, with its bottom petals artfully draped over the edge. The villa’s windows are stationed behind an overlaid bamboo lattice that enwraps the entire villa, giving it an alluring, if not elusive personality.

Symbolic for rebirth and groundedness, the lotus is lauded for its ability to bloom beautifully despite murky waters. Positioned in a dense, wooded area, Liyanage’s Hideout Lotus Bamboo Villa bursts from the ground below in bamboo roots and chutes to grow into a hideaway that creates space for recharging and getting away from the thrill of it all.

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

The villa’s ground-level deck contains an outdoor common area complete with petal ceiling fans and rattan furniture.

Forming a cluster of villas, each one of Liyanage’s Hideout Lotus Bamboo Villa is connected to one another by strings of lights.

Reminiscent of cloaked fairy tale bungalows, the bamboo lattice that envelops each villa only enhances their enigmatic personalities.

Draped over the upper deck’s edge, the curved bottom petals of each villa are some of the finer details in Liyanage’s tribute to the lotus flower.

Supported by groups of concrete-fortified bamboo support beams, each lotus villa rests on a stabilized, secure foundation.

These wildlife-inspired futuristic cabins suspend off the cliffs like StarWars jets ready for takeoff!

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Thilina Liyanage is a Sri Lankan 3D visualizer who conceptualized architectural fortresses that resemble wildlife, including villas that bend over mountainsides or a yacht club whose roof flexes into the curve of a manta ray’s backside. Developed to be constructed entirely from sustainable building material like bamboo and responsibly harvested wooden chutes, some of Thilina Liyanage’s 3D visualizations take a different approach. For example, one of his recent designs finds futuristic glass and metallic cabins inspired by the shape of dolphins puncturing a cliffside overlooking the ocean.

Similar to his Cliff Cabin 3D visualization, Liyanage’s Futuristic Ocean Cabins are lodged into a tropical mountainside, piercing the cliff to suspend in midair with a cantilever structure. Resembling the shape of a dolphin’s body, the Futuristic Ocean Cabins doubly mimic the rugged science fiction aesthetic of Star Wars, stationed on the cliffside like resistance X-Wing fighter jets ready for battle. Liyanage envisioned each structure bored into the cliffside with angled steel beams wrapped in concrete and yanked tight on their horizontal planes with four high-tensile suspension cables to create enough support for each cabin’s foundation. Accessible from an adjacent steel staircase, the interiors of Liyanage’s Futuristic Ocean Cabins come complete with enough space for a bathroom, sleeping area, kitchen, as well as a small living area.

Coated with glass facades reinforced with a concrete framework, Liyanage envisioned a future getaway that hinges on a transparent, exposed external structure and linear, open-air internal space. Jutting out from their cliffside foundation with the same tension of Star Wars III, the true thrill of Liyanage’s Futuristic Ocean Cabins rests in their support methods (four high-tensile suspension cables and one main support beam bored into the cliffside) to keep its cantilever structure horizontal over the bustling ocean below.

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

The wildlife of the mountainside merges with the futuristic structure of Futuristic Ocean Cabins to create a rugged, sci-fi escapist hideaway.

Bored into the mountainside, Thilina Liyanage’s Futuristic Ocean Cabins remain suspended over the sea.

The cabin’s glass facade framed with concrete give it a rugged look fit for the set of Star Wars.

Inside, the linear layout of each cabin allows space for a living and sleeping area, as well as a kitchen and bathroom.





In addition to the cabins’ beam foundation support, four high-tensile suspension cables sling the cabins horizontally over the ocean.

A vertical steel staircase grants access to each cabin’s interior space.

The cabin’s cantilever design gives it the thrilling edge that Thilina Liyanage is quickly becoming known for.

Equipped with all the amenities and utilities that one might need, the thrill of living above the ocean is balanced with human comforts like AC and septic tanks.

Luxury Yacht Club shaped like a manta ray poises gracefully above the ocean

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Luxury Yacht Club Manta Ray

It might be no match for Jeff Bezos’ superyacht (which is big enough to probably have its own yacht club inside it), but there’s definitely a lot that’s awe-striking about Thilina Liyanage’s Luxury Yacht Club. Inspired by the shape of a manta ray, the club sprawls over a chunk of the coastline, providing an area for yacht-owners to mingle while their million-dollar marine-vehicles stay docked around the manta ray’s periphery. The club extends over both water and land, looking almost like a manta ray swimming towards the shore with its tail facing the distant watery horizon.

The Luxury Yacht Club comes from the mind of Sri Lanka-based Thilina Liyanage, an architect and 3D visualizer who’s begun to impress with his nature-inspired architectural marvels. His past projects include a beachside restaurant/shack shaped to look like a massive goldfish, and a set of restaurants inspired by a pelican’s beak, located on the precipice of a cliff. The Luxury Yacht Club is yet another expressive vision from the designer, of a waterfront property inspired by a water-based animal. The resemblance to the manta ray is spot on, with the elaborate use of the right colors, volumes, proportions, and curves.

Luxury Yacht Club Manta Ray

Luxury Yacht Club Manta Ray

The manta ray-shaped building floats on a wooden pier built on the coast of an ocean or sea, with its large mouth acting as the structure’s entrance and the tail extending off to form the club’s branched piers where the yachts can dock. While the yachts remain docked, the club’s large canopy provides a great space for owners to mingle around. Its spacious design is big enough for a concierge, lounge, bar, restaurant, and a host of other facilities one could expect from an exclusive luxury club meant for millionaires.

Luxury Yacht Club Manta Ray

Liyanage tends to resort to the use of bamboo to realize his organic architecture designs, but that’s not the case with the Luxury Yacht Club. Made to be much larger in size than some of his other structures (and to also be able to withstand winds and tides), the club comes fabricated from large metal pipes that are curved to form the manta ray’s basic frame. The pipes are then clad with a canvas or cloth to give it volume while making it look quite like the manta ray’s white underbelly. The fabric helps diffuse sunlight during the day, illuminating the club’s interiors, while allows light from the inside to diffuse outwards at night, making for a wonderful aerial view!

Designer: Thilina Liyanage

Luxury Yacht Club Manta Ray

Luxury Yacht Club Manta Ray

Luxury Yacht Club Manta Ray

This pelican-beak restaurant overlooks a cliff with an absolutely stunning view

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It’s probably because I haven’t traveled around a lot in the past year and a half, but Thilina Liyanage‘s renders are looking increasingly realistic and awe-striking… and I can’t blame myself for feeling that rather lost feeling of wanderlust. Sri Lanka-based Liyanage’s been responsible for creating some of the most awe-striking architectural designs that relate beautifully to their surroundings – like a jagged cabin sitting upon a rocky beach, or a goldfish-shaped bar overlooking an ocean. This time, Liyanage’s design gives you a birds-eye view of a valley, while being shaped like a bird’s beak!

The Sky Restaurants, as they’re called, cantilever off the precipice of a mountain, giving you a certain thrill as you dine. Its design takes cues from a pitcher-plant, using a boat-like base that projects from the slope, with a slightly raised roof to protect you from the elements while also giving you a stunning view of the mountainous terrain in front of and below you. Like a lot of Liyanage’s designs, the Sky Restaurant uses curved bamboo pieces, giving it a distinctly tropical feeling that does set up a contrast against the mountains… but then again, look at it from above and it almost looks like fairy-lights strung around the mountain!

Designer: Thilina Liyanage