Floating House – A new icon of living

The Austrian timber construction specialist GRIFFNER starts building a new series of prefabricated houses in its factory in Carinthia as a masterpiece of functional living design. It was designed by the reknown Studio F. A. Porsche. It’s the collaboration of two premium brands that stand for visionary thinking and perfection: The world-famous Studio F. A. Porsche designed a house for the first time in its history and found a partner in the Carinthian timber construction specialist GRIFFNER, who realized this vision with the highest precision and quality.

The first GRIFFNER Floating House Design by Studio F. A. Porsche has been unveiled at the company’s site in Griffen. GRIFFNER is now producing the Floating House in its factory in various designs to order. The shell will be completed in just two weeks and will be ready for occupancy in five to seven months. Future buyers can marvel at an iconic masterpiece of functional home design. Like all GRIFFNER houses, the Floating House stands for sustainable construction with wood, healthy living and the best building biology. It consistently meets the highest standards of craftsmanship and architecture. Striking stylistic elements of the two-storey GRIFFNER Floating House Design by Studio F. A. Porsche are the continuous façade bands and the black glass tiles that encase the entire first floor and give the house its unmistakable floating shell. Impressive is the room height of up to 5.85 meters. The Floating House also boasts a number of technical innovations. These include floor-to-ceiling windows that are directly integrated into the walls at the factory, the monumental entrance door (1.70 meters wide and 2.64 meters high) with an asymmetrical pivot point and unique precision craftsmanship such as invisible standing seams or downpipes for the roof drainage, which are elegantly concealed behind the glass façade. The two floors are connected on the inside by a free-floating staircase with a continuous glass finish.

Only authentic and sustainable materials of the highest quality, such as wood and glass are being used. The Floating House features other design highlights created by Studio F. A. Porsche from brands such as Duravit (Qatego bathroom series), LIGHT-POINT (INLAY and BLADE lighting collection), HAFI (Premium Design door handles) and the legendary 247 billiard table, to which a separate salon is dedicated in the building.

GRIFFNER owner Georg C. Niedersüß: „Visionary design and forward-looking architecture are combined in the Floating House with the promise of maximum living health. The materials we surround ourselves with are crucial to our well-being. These are all values for which we at GRIFFNER stand for. This applies to the Floating House as well as to all other GRIFFNER wooden houses.“

By merging industrial design, architecture and industrial prefabrication, an ideal floor plan and optimum dimensions have been found that allow the new GRIFFNER Floating House to be scaled variably in width, depth and height, thus adapting perfectly to any property. This modular philosophy opens up a multitude of possibilities and can theoretically be extended endlessly. Another stylistic element is the façade bands, which bring additional light into the building from the outside at different heights, making the individual structures appear to float as an illusion to the eye. The black glass tiles that encase the first floor create an unmistakable appearance. The incident light is refracted in different ways and reflects the surroundings in an impressive reflection. A technical masterpiece: each individual glass tile is invisibly attached to the house by hand using a specially patented process.

„For Studio F. A. Porsche, design is never just aesthetics, but above all content. This attitude and the legacy of German engineering of our founder Prof. Ferdinand Alexander Porsche form the basis for our work as designers,“ says Tobias Hüttl, Design Director Porsche Lifestyle Group. It is a new perspective that the designers have adopted for this project: They not only look at the object itself, but are completely surrounded by it. The construction method relies on typical GRIFFNER advantages. The timber construction forms the heart of the Floating House. „The limits of what is feasible have been redefined. For example, with the oversized room height of up to room height of up to 5.85 meters or maximum light flow through the floor-to-ceiling window fronts. This creates a new feeling of absolute freedom,“ says Hüttl. The GRIFFNER Floating House Design by Studio F. A. Porsche can be purchased from a size of approx. 180 square meters. The unmistakable design is exclusive to the Floating House. Customers can choose between different designs and fittings. The perfection of the workmanship, the quality of the materials and the design are predefined by the designers at Studio F. A. Porsche. This ensures that the Floating House retains its value as an iconic one-off for the long term.

Like all GRIFFNER timber houses, the Floating House is also prefabricated in the company’s factory in Griffen using elaborate craftsmanship and precise precision work. The advantage: everything takes place under the same optimum conditions every time. It takes around three weeks to produce the individual parts for the house in the factory. The shell can be completed in two weeks. Depending on the furnishings, the GRIFFNER Floating House Design by Studio F. A. Porsche is ready for occupancy in around five to seven months. Around 25 specialist companies are involved in the construction of the Floating House. Each one contributes to the uniqueness of the Floating House with its outstanding expertise. Certain production processes were developed especially for this house and have even been patented. Thus, the GRIFFNER Floating House Design by Studio F. A. Porsche fulfills the visionary realization of functional living design as a new icon of freedom.