Canvas Hotels are not like other hotels, they offer the world’s coolest wilderness hotels. Their wish is that the guests experience nature, adrenaline, the silence, warmth and cold and a sense of enjoyment.
Jan Fasting, the forward-thinking owner of Canvas Hotels approached Yurts For Life 10 years ago to supply “luxury wilderness yurts”, able to withstand a harsh Nordic environment. Yurts For Life worked closely with Canvas Hotels to create yurts that would withstand the low temperatures and offer cosy accommodation through most of the year thanks to a sturdier structure, thicker woollen insulation and winter covers. The team of expert Yurt Makers redesigned the frames to an arctic specification to support the weight of the winter snow. The modular component design of the Yurts allowed easy installation on wooden decks that stretch out over the lake.
Canvas Hotel Telemark is situated in a secret location on a lake island 15km off-road from the main road, so the logistics of getting the yurts from the workshop in Devon to the Norwegian site was a huge challenge. The yurts arrived in Norway by ship and the components were then accompanied by the Yurts For Life team under-slung by helicopter, then driven by truck to the lake followed by a boat trip to the island.
With all the yurt components and accessories in place, a team consisting of master carpenters, expert sewers, a scuba-diver and the yurt hire installation squad supported local platform builders to create the Canvas Hotel. A designer-machinist was also there to measure, cut, sew and install on site as required.
Standard yurts were supplied to the original Telemark site but there have since been upgrades including en-suite additions to the accommodation yurts, a large communal lounge yurt with amazing suspended woodburner, a specially adapted sauna yurt and tailor-made canvas covers for the kitchen, dining room and staff camp.
Espen Bierud from Canvas Hotels said “Yurts for Life provided us with the whole works! A complete service from working together on the design and build specifications, negotiating the challenging logistics to deliver the yurts to us (no mean feat) and a great professional installation team. Top Notch!”
To date, Yurts For Life have supplied 18 Yurts to Canvas Hotels, and they continue to enjoy the creative collaboration, recently creating boat shaped yurts. Owner Sacha Macey: “The experience of over-engineering the structures to survive Nordic conditions means that we have perfected production for any future Arctic projects. It has been proved that our Yurts can survive extreme conditions while being innovative and stunning“.
