No stranger to unconventional projects, XTU Architect’s X_Lands project looks at life after oil and what to do with all the offshore platforms that have been built in the last century to drill for the Earth’s natural resources.

Mankind’s appetite for these fossil fuels has had a tremendous impact on the natural environment. As the age of oil comes to an end and countries look toward utilising renewable and greener energy sources, XTU Architects proposes to tackle the symbols of the oil companies: the offshore platform.

With their immense scale, oil rig structures have an interesting potential for adaption. This project imagines the industrial monoliths transformed into poetic, habitable and exotic homes, or X_Lands.

Imagined as bubbles or containers of housing, each proposal adds lush greenery to the industrial structures, bringing a much-needed human and natural touch to the rigs.

Envisioned as a ‘sustainable path for tomorrow’, the project by XTU architects aims to mark a change of paradigms.

Via designboom | Images courtesy of XTU Architects