Fri | Dec 26, 2025

Dream house throwback!

Published:Sunday | May 5, 2019 | 12:00 AM
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World-famous floating villa, seen in countless international magazines and TV programmes. Located in San San, Port Antonio, on the blue lagoon, it astonishingly has the river from the mountains flowing under the house into sea in a spectacular waterfall effect.
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A bold use of concrete that defies explanation.
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One of Jamaica’s most photographed houses, in upper St Andrew. Engineers first said it could not be built. It is as much an astounding piece of architecture, as it is an engineering feat.
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A house that is definitely in flight, designed to lift you higher and higher. One of my designed and built projects, in the hills of St Andrew.
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Luxurious three storey house on six acres in Savanna-La-Mar, Westmoreland. Built for and occupied by three young children, as their backyard playhouse!
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This 'cliff hanger' residence in Irish Town leaves you gasping, as it projects from a precariously steep hillside in mostly thin air! Constant faith, unbounded creativity and immense courage has brought it to life.
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This towering architectural inferno in Norbrook Heights, St Andrew, burns with the most modern of design elements, illuminating its mountain top position.
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A space age house from another time... another dimension. A radical and unorthodox design in Montego Bay.
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In the first 10 years of writing this Dream House series, from 1992 to 2002, I searched and discovered houses that aroused interest, evoked awe and downright disbelief. Example, a house with a bomb shelter for World War III. A house with no windows, but a glass roof, with a garden and rivers running on the inside and, homes with furniture and art pieces from Christies and Southey’s auction houses, so expensive that most people in the world could not afford them.

Here are some examples from those years … a glimpse into the past.

- Barry Rattray is a dream house designer and builder. Email: barry-rattray@hotmail.com/Lifestyle@gleanerjm.com.