Aug 27, 2014 3:50 PM

Gallery: These Aren't Futuristic Homes for People. They're Luxury Condos for Bees

Photo: Finn Ståle Felberg
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2014074-OS-N25
Snøhetta designed these sleek beehives for the rooftop of Mathellen Oslo, a food court in the city’s Grünerløkka district.
Photo: Morten Brakestad
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Bikuber på Mathallen
For a few years, Grünerløkka has developed similarly to Brooklyn: once-industrial factories and old lots are being flipped into urban greenhouses, craft breweries, and farm-to-table restaurants.

Photo: Morten Brakestad
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Bikuber på Mathallen
That includes a local beekeeper who proposed building hives for 160,000 bees next to the food court’s rooftop garden.
Photo: Morten Brakestad
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Bikuber på Mathallen
The Snøhetta architects created three ideas, and let the beekeeper choose.

Illustration: Snøhetta
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Snøhetta-Urban beehive diagram
They shells act like casings for standard foam beehives. The different chambers are for the worker bees and the queen bee.
Photo: Morten Brakestad
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Bikuber på Mathallen
So as not to disorient the bees, the architects designed the exterior of the beehives to be as organic and familiar as possible, by reflecting the honeycomb structures on the interior.

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