"This house is from the future," observed a fourth-grader as she and fellow classmates toured the Lumenhaus, a net-zero home built by students at Virginia Tech University for the 2009 Solar Decathlon. The home had its first public reception among engineers and bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., where it took the bronze in architecture and came in 13th overall in the 20-school contest this October. But some time around midnight on Jan. 27, the trailer-hitched house rolled across the George Washington Bridge and down Seventh Avenue for a 48-hour stint in the middle of Times Square. As the school children toured the 650-square-foot structure, oohing and aahing as cabinetry slid away to reveal a flat-screen television, one child remarked that the house "is perfect for New York City," and another said, "it's perfect for me." 

That seemed to be the general sentiment among passersby. New Yorkers, instantly interrogating designers about how much the house cost, reacted with piqued interest at the locally reasonable $250,000 to $300,000 asking price—a figure that elicited groans in D.C. A Times Square security guard, tempted by the fantasy of buying a nice little spread upstate and plunking this self-sufficient beauty down in the middle of it, pledged to bring his wife and five children back to tour the house before it gave up its stake by the Theater Development Fund's TKTS booth the following night. Another guard, asked if he liked the house, responded, "hell yeah," stating that the house trumped a Ferrari, a Bentley, and even a flying Bentley. "You could have a Bentley with wings, and still, if you said, 'I got a solar house,' that takes it. Nothing beats a solar-powered house." The first security guard added, "It's incredible. Nothing goes to waste." 

He's right. Outside the skyscraper shade of Manhattan, the house's solar panels generate enough juice to power its efficient appliances and its surprisingly homey, diffuse fluorescent lighting. It channels rainwater via a waterfall into a collection tank for irrigation, and its sliding exterior panels can adjust to embrace warm outdoor temperatures or batten down to shelter the home in harsh weather. The sliding panels' exteriors are studded with LEDs, transforming the building into a low-slung lighthouse at nightfall. Daylighting is used throughout, from the skylight over the slick central bathroom to the windows running the length of the long walls. On a chilly afternoon in Times Square, with the intricately fabricated metal screens splayed open, visiting Virginia Tech students and faculty lounged on a living room couch while lights and noise exploded soundlessly beyond the insulated glass. It was, for the day at least, one of the most enviable addresses in the city. Student designer Corey McCalla claimed he'd like to live in this location, "for a while," he said. "I'd at least like to sleep one night here." 

This glowing facade pierced the darkness during its evenings on the National Mall, but the lights of Times Square eclipse the home critiqued by Solar Decathlon rivals in D.C. as "a house that glows in the dark—whoopie." Here in Manhattan, beneath blinking Brobdingnagian underwear advertisements and the luminous latest in American Eagle apparel, the bright house just blended right in. "It's humbling," said McCalla, when contemplating a perch in one of just a few places, Blacksburg excluded, where the Lumenhaus wouldn't light up the night sky. 

It's almost a shame the shack couldn't stick around a bit longer, as sales of replica models through the weekend could surely have funded the next several Solar Decathlons solely on the backs of real-estate-hungry New Yorkers. But it's probably for the best that the house didn't plant roots on 47th Street—this house is due at the international Solar Decathlon in Madrid this June, where it will compete against homes built in China, Finland, Florida and other exotic architectural locales. We hope that students at Virginia Tech took note of New Yorkers' constructive criticism, or at the very least noted one fourth grader's observation in the bedroom: "If this were a water bed, that'd be awesome." There is still time for a few design tweaks before Madrid.