Snøhetta's Rusutsu Villa Has Two Summers Left to Build

NOT A HOTEL RUSUTSU, the Snøhetta designed villa on the summit of Rusutsu Resort in Hokkaido, can only be built in the warm months, and the calendar is short. Groundwork has begun, the region's extreme seasonal conditions limit building to summer, and the project is expected to be completed in 2029. With a spring 2029 opening on the schedule, two building summers, 2027 and 2028, remain between now and the day owners arrive.

Two Slender Volumes Bend Toward Yotei

Snøhetta's design is two slender volumes that curve toward Mount Yotei and wrap a central courtyard. Snøhetta lists the building at 1,200 square metres. It sits at the summit of the resort's western mountain, with a clear line to the volcano that is often called the Mount Fuji of Hokkaido.

The idea behind the form is the zenith, the highest point of the celestial sphere above a given location. Snøhetta carries that notion of reaching new heights into spaces meant to elevate the human experience while paying homage to the surrounding landscape and the iconic mountain. Rusutsu is a destination known for powder snow in winter and outdoor experiences in summer, and the villa is shaped by those two seasons rather than by one of them.

Three firms split the work. Snøhetta is the overall designer, Kume Sekkei is the detailed designer and Iwata Chizaki Construction is the builder.

1,200 Square Metres of Building, 2,574.2 of Exclusive Use

Two numbers describe the same villa and they do not match. Snøhetta puts the building at 1,200 square metres, while NOT A HOTEL's sales release gives a total exclusive use area of 2,574.2 square metres, the largest property the company has announced. The sources do not say how each figure is counted, so treat them as two measurements, not a correction.

Boss Hunting reports eight bedrooms, four bathrooms and direct access to the resort's all season slopes. NOT A HOTEL says its images are computer renderings and subject to change, so the dimensions above can move.

Sales of fractional ownership opened on August 25, 2025. Owners can use their allotted nights or trade them for stays across the NOT A HOTEL network, and the group offers the villa to guests when owners have not reserved it. Rusutsu sits on the far side of Mount Yotei from Niseko, whose Hirafu village is roughly 30 kilometres away, and guides describe it as the quieter side of the mountain.

Hokkaido Already Holds Another NOT A HOTEL Object

NOT A HOTEL has been building a Hokkaido ledger with very different tools. A Poke Ball shaped guest room, developed with Pokemon Sleep, has a rear entry door and a window facing the surrounding forest. In Chiba, NOT A HOTEL TOKYO is a cliffside villa on the Futtsu coast, creative directed by NIGO and sold as twelve ownership shares of thirty nights a year each. Its mobility arm, NOT A GARAGE, is selling shared ownership of a Gulfstream G500 jet that NIGO directed.

Those three lean on a name, a franchise or a creative director. Rusutsu leans on an architect and a mountain, with no character or celebrity on the label. It is a different bet for the company, and it carries the largest exclusive use area NOT A HOTEL has announced.

Snøhetta is not the first studio to answer altitude with a building. Herzog and de Meuron turned a 1980s Swiss Army antenna tower above 3,000 metres at Engelberg into the TITLIS Tower, a glass walled observatory and restaurant. The two projects share a constraint more than a look: weather decides when anyone can work, and the form has to make that worth it.

Spring 2029 Is the Only Date That Matters

The schedule is the design's hardest specification. Rusutsu's conditions limit building to the summer months, groundwork has begun, and the opening is set for spring 2029, which leaves the 2027 and 2028 summers to finish a villa with two curved volumes and a courtyard on a summit. The count is arithmetic from those dates, and a slipped summer would move the opening a season.

A 1,200 square metre building aimed at Mount Yotei, 2,574.2 square metres of exclusive use around it, and two summers to build both: those are the numbers Snøhetta and NOT A HOTEL have put on a spring 2029 opening.