The Dutch answer to fears over climate change and lack of space is a modern three storey luxury villa with a roof terrace, large living room, three bedrooms and, crucially ... a waterproof hull. Alix Rijckaert reports.

Dozens of Dutch municipalities are planning new districts with room for floating homes and, as more and more so-called water lots become available, the market is experiencing a boom.

"There is this idea that its reassuring that these houses will stay afloat even if the Netherlands are flooded," Yvonne de Korte of the Amsterdam architecture centre Arcam told AFP.

In the Netherlands, a densely populated country where one third of the land is below sea level, the threat of rising sea levels is a constant one.
"We are no longer only worrying about global warming, we are now actively looking for solutions for the consequences of climate change," climatologist Rik Leemans of the Wageningen University said.

"There has been a real change in the Dutch mentality ... Before we were hiding behind our dykes. Now we are finding ways to create space for rising water levels and looking upon it as a chance to develop new ideas," he added.

The Dutch government is not only keeping up the maintenance on its impressive system of dykes and flood dams but has also launched plans to divert rivers and create designated delta areas that can be flooded in case of a sudden rise in water levels.

The luxury floating villa by ABC Arkenbouw on show in Amsterdam together with the exhibition "Living on Water" is a prototype aimed at people who buy so-called water lots in IJburg.

IJburg is a new housing development built on an artificial island in the east of Amsterdam and is expected to house 45,000 people between now and 2020.
The water lots in the new neighbourhood are on sale for between 110,000 and 140,000 euros (151,000 and 192,000 dollars) and allow people to moor a floating house on a special landing.

"It is a great new market, we are building 40 floating homes this year and plan 60 next year," said Marian Spenkeler of ABC Arkenbouw.
The company is specialised in building houseboats, the classic barge type that you see in the canals of Amsterdam, and is now turning more and more to constructing boathouses that look like floating villas.

"It attracts all kinds of buyers from young families with kids to pensioners," Sprenkeler said.

The floating villas cost around 250,000 euros. Taken with the price of the lot, this is a little lower than the prices for comparable family homes on IJburg.

The boathouse is built with the latest technology with all modern conveniences and floats on a concrete pontoon that doubles as a partly submerged basement with bedrooms.

For most of the 20th century houseboat dwellers were, according to architecture expert De Korte, considered "a fringe group, poor people who did not have enough money to buy a real house on firm ground."

In the 1970s houseboats become a popular choice for hippies as the ultimate sign of rejecting the bourgeois lifestyle.

In the last 10 years, that has changed as living on water has become increasingly fashionable and a number of housing projects started including water houses in their development plans.

To give an idea of the different forms of living on water Arcam has organised an exhibit in Amsterdam with models and real houseboats, including one over 80 years old.

August 2007

[Copyright AFP]