There are supposed to be buildings so vast that they create their own weather systems. In practice, that would probably result in an unattractive combination of gigantism and drizzle. In wonderful contrast, Dutch artist Berndnaut Smilde has brought the beauty and fragility of the surreal to a 15th century chapel in the Dutch town of Hoorn. By precisely controlling the temperature and humidity of the exhibition space in the Hotel Maria Kappel, Smilde was able to create a single cloud, which stood for a moment with graceful incongruence a few feet above the ground. In 2010, he achieved the same remarkable effect at Probe, an exhibition space in Arnhem.

His work Cumulus uses material even stranger than cloud – Aerogel, or frozen smoke an ultra light manufactured material, created from a gel by replacing the liquid component of the gel with gas. Only three times heavier than the equivalent volume of air, it rests like a cloud itself above an architectural model.