The history of the hermitage is a long and fascinating one, telling of monastic religious figures, social outcasts, novelists in seclusion, war deserters, and the kinds of mysterious older women often assumed to be witches. Humble and small, the habitats preferred for a life of utter solitude are typically found in remote places like forests or mountaintops.
They?re often shed-like in their scale and the low sophistication of their materials, containing little more than a bed and a table. Some of the people who occupy them might be seeking wisdom or healing in asceticism, while others might be fleeing outside influences.
A small, lone cabin in the woods might still strike fear in the hearts of hikers who stumble upon it, especially if it?s particularly rustic or unkempt – but even modern remote hideaways can look like they belong in fairytales or horror movies. When a man in the Czech Republic wanted to build himself a retreat where he could ?hole up? and recharge in between demanding projects at work in the city of Prague, he approached Uhlik Architekti with an unusual vision. No doubt, the finished project is odd, and still, perhaps, a little unsettling. Pitch black on the outside, it?s tipped up onto a boulder on one end, almost as if it fell from the sky. Gazing at it within these woods, one could imagine all sorts of strange backstories for its presence. The truth about its usage may be mundane, but the cabin itself certainly is not.

The architects call the sett...