Drive This House

Filed under: Architecture, News & Trends, Cool Homes

A house designed to look like a car is a true motor home.

At first glance, this might look like a child's toy -- Hot Wheels, maybe? But it's actually a real house created by master builder Markus Voglreiter. Modeled after the original Volkswagen Beetle and located near Salzburg, Austria, the unique car-shaped structure really does look like a Beetle, enormous wheels and all.

It wasn't always supposed to look like a car. Originally, Voglreiter purchased the lot and planned to renovate the existing house. But the lot was too steep for his plans. After joking with a friend that they might as well live in their cars, he got an idea -- why not build the house to look like one of his favorite vehicles?

The three-story, 900-square-foot auto-shaped home sits on a cement foundation and is made mostly out of pine. It has two bedrooms located on the second floor, whose windows are the car's headlights. In the evening, the light from the bedrooms brings the car's silhouette alive even more, like a car driving along a dark street.

Voglreiter, his wife Ursula, and their two children live in the house. The home created some tension with neighbors -- would you want this house next door? Plus, there are many people coming to the home just to get a glimpse of it. The wheels are partially built to help obscure the interior space and keep lookiloos out.

The house cost approximately £750,000, or about $1.1 million, to build, and Voglreiter is not opposed to helping someone build their very own "motor home." Could one of these be popping up in your neighborhood?

More automotive design: furniture from old car parts, perfect for inside your car-shaped home!

 

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