Archipelago Cinema in Thailand by Buro Ole Scheeren

If the experience of watching an open-air film fills you with delight, then this little beauty is going to knock your socks off. Part architectural masterpiece, part theatre going spectacle, this floating auditorium was created for Thailand’s Film on the Rocks Festival.

The auditorium, a raft of sorts, intended to float on the sea, was designed by German-born and Beijing-based architect Ole Scheeren. The raft is built out of recycled materials as a series of individual modules. This allows the unit to be flexible for future use and to allow the raft to travel to other film screenings on the water.

It’s nothing short of a breathtaking backdrop to view film and art. Surrounded by momentous rocks rising out of the sea with inky dark water reflecting light off the screen, it offers a complete submersion with both the natural landscape and the cinematic one. If film itself is known to be dramatic, this viewing platform is nothing short of the same.

“The thought of watching films here seemed surprising. A screen, nestled somewhere between the rocks. And the audience… floating… hovering above the sea, somewhere in the middle of this incredible space of the lagoon, focused on the moving images across the water,” commented Ole Scheeren.

“A sense of temporality, randomness, almost like driftwood. Or maybe something more architectural: Modular pieces, loosely assembled, like a group of little islands that congregate to form an auditorium.”

With Archipelago Cinema, Ole Scheeren has been able to delve further into his love of non-architectural projects. He manages to create here an alternative way of experiencing something as well versed as watching films in an entirely new and engaging manner.

If you missed its début, it’s not too late. The raft, after it has travelled the world, will eventually return to the island and be donated to the local community of Yao Noi. Assuming the locals are happy to share this magical way to see a movie, you can always bunk in and watch it with them.