Transparent House: Tokyo, Japan

This house in Tokyo by Sou Fukimoto Architects, known as House NA, stands out with its modern and transparent style. The interior of the residence has hardly any walls. The house boasts large glass windows for plenty of daylight, but the downside is a lack of privacy.

The three-story edifice features various levels of living space within the segmented structure that's great to just hang out on, as if you were perched atop a tree branch. House NA is the modern interpretation of an adult treehouse for permanent residence.

Beach Rock Treehouse: Okinawa Japan

 

High above the ground in Japan's Okinawa forest lies the Beach Rock Tree house. It was built by tree house creator Kobayashi Takashi – originally to communicating with extra-terrestrials.
Ladders and platforms providing safe access to the tree house despite its height. For the adrenalin junkies, there's a giant rope swing nearby to take you sailing through the treetops!

Chittorgarh Fort, India

 

Chittorgarh Fort is the largest fort in India and the grandest in the state of Rajasthan. The fort, plainly known as Chittor, sprawls majestically over a hill above the plains of the valley drained by the Berach River. The fort precinct with an evocative history is studded with a series of historical palaces, gates, temples and two prominent commemoration towers. These monumental ruins have inspired the imagination of tourists and writers for centuries.

Sigiriya: The Lion Rock of Sri Lanka

 

Deep in the middle of Sri Lanka, a massive column of rock juts out from the green tropical forest. It reaches 660 feet tall and features frescoes, graffiti, and landscaped gardens. The rock is known as Sigiriya (see-gee-REE-yah) and holds a special place in the island’s cultural history.

It was established as the stronghold of a rogue king over 1,500 years ago, and today the Sigiriya complex stands as one of the earliest preserved examples of ancient urban planning. Ultimately the rock was unable to save its king, but it succeeded in preserving ancient Sinhalese culture.

Petra, Jordan

Petra (from the Latin word 'petrae', meaning 'rock') lies in a great rift valley east of Wadi 'Araba in Jordan about 80 kilometers south of the Dead Sea. It came into prominence in the late first century BCE (BC) through the success of the spice trade. The city was the principal city of ancient Nabataea and was famous above all for two things: its trade and its hydraulic engineering systems. It was locally autonomous until the reign of Trajan, but it flourished under Roman rule. The town grew up around its Colonnaded Street in the first century CE (AD) and by the mid-first century had witnessed rapid urbanization. Following the flow of the Wadi Musa, the city-center was laid out on either sides of the Colonnaded Street on an elongated plan between the theater in the east and the Qasr al-Bint in the west. The quarries were probably opened in this period, and there followed virtually continuous building through the first and second centuries CE.

Aogashima Volcano, Japan

 

Aogashima is a small, tropical volcanic island in the Philippine Sea, under the administration of Tokyo despite being located some 358 kilometers away from the country’s capital. It is the southernmost and the most isolated inhabited island of the Izu archipelago. The island itself is a giant volcanic crater, and within that crater there’s another, smaller volcano. Aogashima is still considered an active Class-C volcano though it last erupted in the 1780′s. When last erupted it killed nearly half of the island’s population and forced the remaining inhabitants to flee. It took just fifty years for the people to return. Today, some 200 brave villagers live on the island.

The Manhattan of the Desert: Shibam, Yemen

 

Deep in the middle of Yemen lays a town nearly two-thousand years old that pioneered skyscrapers.  Shibam, a town of about 7,000 people, was founded sometime around the 3rd century AD.  The town was built in its unique way to help protect residents from regional Bedouin attacks. Enormous clay walls were built around the city and residences were built upward rather than outward. Shibam is often referred to as “the oldest skyscraper city in the world,” and is one of the oldest examples of vertical urban planning.