The moment Wenji Zhang saw photos of the No Footprint Wood House, in April 2023, she was smitten. The wood-slatted house in the rainforest of southwestern Costa Rica was for sale — and its delicate beauty, its openness to nature, stunned her.

She showed the images to her husband, Paul Lehmann, who also liked the design, but was hesitant. He promptly pointed out that, only two months earlier, they had purchased another, far more conventional house in a nearby village as a tropical retreat from their main home in a suburb of Cleveland. But a week later, once back in Costa Rica, they decided to visit the rainforest house in Puntarenas province anyway — just to see it.

Dr. Lehmann, 68, describes himself as a “rational guy” — a levelheaded scientist, who, like his wife, Dr. Zhang, 48, is an immunologist. But once he stepped over that threshold, high in the hills, and looked across the lush jungle to the nearby Pacific Coast, he said in an interview, “it was love at first sight.”

“This was like a temple, a work of art immersed in nature," he said, “and undeniably the place for us.”

On the spot, he insisted they buy it, and somehow find a solution for the Costa Rican house they already owned. (Fortunately, he said, that same day, a lifelong friend offered to purchase it.)

ImageThe No Footprint Wood House is in the rainforest of southwestern Costa Rica.Credit...Fernando Alda

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