In summary, Norwegians have never searched more for micro houses in Finn than now. Researchers believe that micro-house villages can be the solution to the housing challenges of the future. Norway’s first micro-house village that combines year-round residences and a shared apple orchard is under construction in Skjolden in Western Norway. The micro-house is located in a yard and the residents can gather in a communal house. There they can also sell produce from the apple garden. Community and a culture of sharing are factors that researchers believe attract people to the project that is now underway at Skjolden. The summary is made by an AI service from OpenAI. The content is quality assured by news’s journalists before publication. – The community will be very important, says Lone Amundsen. In just under two weeks, she will move from Vesterålen to Skjolden, a small village in Western Norway that she had hardly heard of before. There he will live in the country’s first micro-house village with a communal living room and apple orchard. With that, she goes from a detached house of over 500 to 33 square metres. – It will be a big transition, but I am very happy. I want to live more lightly and closer to nature. Amundsen goes from being able to frolic on 500 square meters in Jennestad to the sober 33 square meters in Skjolden. Here outside his house in Vesterålen. Photo: Private first in the country these days, Mikrohusa is lifted directly onto the foundation wall. Eventually, they will be surrounded by hundreds of apple trees, and there will be a total of 11 houses on the yard. The project is the first of its kind in Norway. Project manager Torill Bye Wilhelmsen calls the village “a modern cluster farm”. – The combination of an organic apple orchard and year-round cottages is unique, she says. Torill Bye Wilhelmsen is the project manager for Eplehagen microhouse village. She herself lives in a mini house in Skjolden with her family. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel Husa went on sale in February, and eight out of eleven are sold. So far, all the buyers are movers. – The greatest interest has been from highly educated women who are very aware of what they want to spend their time and their lives on. Record for searches for micro-houses Never before have Norwegians searched as much for micro-houses on the Finn market place as this year. So far this year, there have been 4,229 searches for micro houses. It is higher than in the whole of 2022. – It is a cheap way to live when housing and rental prices are very high, thinks Linda Glomlien in Finn may be one of the reasons for the increased interest. This is how the micro houses in Skjolden can look inside. Photo: Norske mikrohus She says everything indicates that they will see a much higher number of searches for microhouses this year than last year, even though interest was great then as well. – We see a completely obvious change in that people are more curious about partial solutions, says researcher Solvår Irene Wågø at Sintef. She has researched various forms of housing, and believes there is a great need for a project of the type that is now materializing in Skjolden. – We need everything that can challenge the Norwegian model where the only thing that matters is the detached house. For many, the dream of a simpler life in the countryside is about getting a better place. – That people prefer to live close together on smaller areas in the village tells us something that it is the community that moves, says Wågø. In the micro-house village in Skjolden, residents can gather in a communal house. – There they can eat dinner together, hang out, play music, do handicrafts, or sell produce that they have grown in the garden, says project manager Wilhelmsen. Solvår Irene Wågø is research leader for a subject group called architecture and society in the Sintef Community. She thinks the project in Skjolden is very exciting. Photo: Anne-Line Bakken/SINTEF It is precisely the joint solutions that the researcher believes make the project so appealing. A recent survey from Trondheim shows that the neighborhoods where people are most comfortable are where the neighbors know each other well. – Sharing culture is in the air, and projects like this are one way we can build more environmentally friendly and smartly in the future, says Wågø. Year-round residence or holiday home? – Norwegian villages are being depopulated because there is a lack of houses, so this project will have great transfer value to other villages, believes Wågø. The fact that seven houses are sold and the majority are movers is a dream scenario for a small municipality like Luster, says Ole Gunnar Krakhellen in the municipality. Many are working hard to get the first houses safely onto the foundations. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel But the researcher is excited to see whether it will actually become a living, modern cluster garden, or whether it will eventually become holiday homes. Skjolden houses around 350 permanent residents. It is the gateway to Hurrungane and famous for the sea-spun Harastølen. A lovely holiday spot with many holiday homes. In the summer, the population tends to double, due to cruise tourism. The municipality is nevertheless confident that the micro-houses will not become holiday homes. – Developers focus on selling to people who want to live here all year round, so I think there is a good chance that people will do that, Krakhellen answers. Krakhellen is head of administration and development in Luster municipality. The municipality itself has bought two of the micro-houses. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel For Lone Amundsen, who will soon be moving, using the microhouse as a holiday home is not in the cards. She starts a new job in Skjolden and sees herself living there for a long time. – I will live there as long as it feels right to me, she says. Must not become “a straitjacket” Amundsen believes she will use the common area daily. – I am very happy to dig in the ground and tidy up the garden. There will be a shared apple orchard and vegetable garden. They will probably be used a lot. She is not worried that there will be a clash with the others who move into the micro-house village. Project manager Wilhelmsen locks himself into the first micro house on the site. Photo: Oda Flaten Lødemel Wågø, who has studied other collective housing forms, believes that the only thing that can destroy the idyll is if the community is experienced as “a straitjacket”. – Community dinners and guitar playing almost sound like some kind of folk high school ball or a sect? – As long as there are no rigid rules that everyone has to eat dinner together every single Tuesday, for example, then it will probably go very well, says Wågø. Hi!Thank you for reading the whole story. 🏡Do you have thoughts about what you have read, recorded, criticized or praised? Then I would like to hear from you! I work in the office in Sogndal. Feel free to read some of what I have written about previously: Published 06.07.2024, at 15.55
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Norway’s first micro-house village is being built in Skjolden in Luster – news Vestland
