01
A valley with a wall on one side
Trevelin sits east of the cordillera, in the Futaleufú department of Chubut. The range holds the weather; below it the land runs down to water and farmland. This is the ground the project starts from.
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Trevelin · Chubut · Argentine Patagonia
SkySphere
Patagonia Underground
A home beneath the meadow. A slower life, shaped by the seasons.
Choose a season
21 Sep — 20 Dec
The valley awakens.
Blossom, breeze & new beginnings.Architectural concept · Illustrative landscape · Design stage
The vision
Nature above.A new life below.
A circular home cut into the hillside, a living roof returned to the meadow, and a glass dome gathering the light. SkySphere is an architectural concept taking shape in Trevelin. Nothing is built yet.
Explore the conceptOne place. Four different worlds.
A home in every season.
Let the year change the view. Choose a season and step into its rhythm.
Local season calendar · Argentina · UTC−03
A closer look
Inside the vision.
Concept renderings, not photographs of a finished building.
A winter vision of SkySphere.
An atmospheric design study. Architectural visualization with an illustrative landscape.
Open the videoFollow the journey
Make room for a different way of living.
Follow the project from the first sketch. Support its next step through the official Patreon page.
A design-stage project. Membership does not guarantee a stay, ownership or financial return.01 — The project
It started with a hole in the ground
Patagonia Underground is a plan for a single home built into the ground rather than on top of it: an earth-sheltered dwelling that keeps the meadow above it intact, lit from a central glazed dome and opened to the Andes on one side.
- Province
- Chubut, Argentina
- Department
- Futaleufú
- Founded by
- Welsh settlers of Y Wladfa
- Name means
- Town of the mill
03 — Why here
Why Trevelin, and not anywhere else
Trevelin is a small town in the Futaleufú Department of Chubut, in the Andean west of Argentine Patagonia. It was founded by Welsh settlers who crossed the continent from the Atlantic coast, and it still carries their language in its name: tre, town, and felin, mill — the town of the mill.
West of the town the cordillera climbs toward the Chilean border. North-west lies Los Alerces National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site protecting alerce trees that were already ancient when the Welsh arrived. Between them are river valleys, poplar windbreaks, cattle, and long empty roads.
It is also a place with a climate that argues for this kind of building: cold clear winters, dry summers, and a west wind that never really stops. Earth is the cheapest insulation there is, and here it is the obvious one.
The principle
Earth is the cheapest insulation there is — and here, the obvious one.
Soil holds temperature. A buried envelope swings far less between a Patagonian August night and a February afternoon, which means less heating, less cooling, and less equipment to maintain in a place where a replacement part is a long drive away.
02
One hectare, and one decision
The plot is a hundred metres square. Almost all of it stays as it is: the house, a viewing terrace, a fire pit and a parking bay sit on a small part of it, reached by a single track. Where those sit relative to each other is the design; the surveyed position on the ground is not published yet.
03
Cut, not placed
The house goes into the slope rather than onto it. The ground is opened, the shell is built inside the cut, and the meadow is put back over the roof. What is left above ground is a curve in the grass, a dome over the courtyard, and one face of glass.
04
One room, facing the light
Twenty-two metres across, 250 m² inside: living room, kitchen and dining on the daylight side, three bedrooms and two bathrooms around the ring, utility and plant against the earth wall, and a courtyard under the dome holding the middle.
05
The hard part is the section
The shape is the easy question. The difficult ones — waterproofing, drainage, and the weight of wet soil on a roof — are answered in section: 80 to 100 cm of cover, membrane, insulation, a 25 cm retaining wall, drainage board and pipe, and a raft under all of it. That is what the planning phase is working through now.
06
At night, almost nothing
From the approach there is no building to see: a hillside, a lit dome in the grass, and one band of warm light where the glass meets the slope. That restraint is the whole argument — a house that takes almost nothing from the view it was built for.
04 — The land
The land around us
01
Mountains
West of the town the cordillera rises toward the Chilean border — the wall that gives this valley its weather.
02
Forest
Andean-Patagonian forest, and north-west of Trevelin the alerce stands of Los Alerces National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site.
03
Water
Rivers and lakes shape the whole department — the Futaleufú system runs west from here toward the border.
04
Open skies
Open sky in every direction, and the long light of a southern latitude at either end of the day.
05
Trails
Gravel roads and tracks run out of town into the hills. Specific routes are not listed here until they have been walked and checked.
06
Small town life
A small Welsh-founded town with a mill museum, tea houses, and tulip fields that open in spring.
05 — Explore
Explore Trevelin
A conceptual 3D landscape, drawn to show the kind of country this project sits in. It is not a survey of the real terrain.
Conceptual — not survey data
The mountains
The cordillera along the western edge of the department, rising toward the Chilean border.
The forest
Andean-Patagonian forest on the western slopes — the same forest type protected in Los Alerces National Park to the north-west.
The water
The valley's rivers and lakes. In the real landscape, the Futaleufú system runs west toward the border crossing.
Trevelin
A small town founded by Welsh settlers, whose name means 'town of the mill'.
Our future home
The design concept, drawn in three dimensions: a circular plan cut into the shelf, the meadow returned over its roof, a glazed dome over the courtyard and one open face to the valley. Nothing is built — this is the concept, not a survey and not a finished design. The real plot location is not published yet.
Would you build a place like this here?
Tell us what you think06 — Architecture
How an earth-sheltered house actually works
This is a drawing of the principle, not an engineered drawing of a finished building. The hard parts of this kind of construction are not the shape — they are the waterproofing, the drainage, and the weight of the soil sitting on the roof. Those are exactly the questions the planning phase is working through now.
Discover the project →06 — Gallery
The project, image by image
Exterior — night
1 / 13
The house from the approach
The glazed face and the courtyard dome seen from the fire pit below. The roof is the meadow: from this angle the building is a curve in the hillside.
- Location
- Trevelin · Chubut · Argentina
- Credit
- Patagonia Underground · Project concept visualisation — not a photograph
07 — The experience
One day, stay in Patagonia
Patagonia Underground is being built with a future accommodation experience in mind. There is nothing to book yet — no rooms, no dates, no prices. The people on the update list will simply be the first to hear when that changes.
The long-term intention is that this house becomes a place to stay — a small, single-property retreat rather than a hotel. There are no rooms to book, no dates, no prices, and no reservation system, because there is no building yet.
What exists today is the intention, stated openly so that the people following the project know where it is going.
08 — Progress
Seven phases, and we are near the start of them
Every phase below carries its real status. Nothing gets marked complete before it is complete, and no percentage appears until there is something real to measure.
- Idea
- Planning
- Design
- Preparation
- Construction
- Interior
- Opening
09 — Community
Should we really build this house?
We're building this idea one step at a time. Before we open the doors, we'd love to know what you think.
11 — Support
Support the project
If you believe this place should exist, you can help us take the next step.
Support the build
Support the independent Patagonia Underground concept through its official Patreon creator page. Memberships are handled by Patreon.
Patreon — Support the vision ↗Supporting this project does not guarantee a reservation, ownership, profit, or any other financial return.
12 — Follow the journey
Follow Patagonia Underground
Follow the project from the beginning and be among the first to know when Patagonia Underground comes to life.
13 — Early guests
Be one of the first guests
When reservations open, we'd love to let you know first.
Reservations are not open. There is no listing yet, and no date has been set.
14 — What's happened
Updates
Nothing here yet — on purpose
No updates published yet
The first project update will appear here when there is something real to report. Nothing is invented to fill this space.
Maybe this place should exist.
If you think so too, we'd love to hear from you.
No booking · No payment · No deposit · Nothing to buy