Living on or near the sea is an alluring concept, and floating houses have become a popular ways of living in some parts of the world.
For others there is a sense of romance of living on a floating home and over the past few years we have seen a number of luxurious floating home concepts come to market most notably Floating House. However, Miami-based Company Arkup has taken this concept one step further and created an at-sea living solution, a ‘Livable Yacht’ part yacht, part floating house and part luxury waterfront villa.
Created in anticipation of a future of flooding and rising sea level, the livable yacht is a fully self-sufficient eco-friendly, hurricane-resistant home on the water that has the appearance of a luxurious apartment floating on the water. Wrapped in glass the luxury 404-square-metre, double-decker yacht boasts four bedrooms and four and a half bathrooms. A built-in communication suite offers 4G, Satellite TV, Wi-Fi and VHF radio. There’s a sundeck that fully immerses in water to become a protected sea-pool and a boat lift to remove your tender or jet ski from the water.
In order to compete with conventional residential solutions, the Livable Yacht offers a completely stabilized platform using extendable anchored hydraulic spuds, which can raise the structure several meters out of the water to protect from hash weather conditions, storm surges and even hurricanes. In fact, the Livable Yacht solution has been designed to withstand wind speeds up to 135 knots.
And when it’s time to move, the spuds can then be completely retracted into the structure to allow for comfortable cruising and entry into shallower waters. Powered by a 30 kW rooftop solar array that feeds up to 1,000 kWh of lithium-ion batteries, the twin 136-horsepower electric azimuth thrusters can provide a top speed of seven knots, allowing it to roam from location to location at a leisurely pace. And electric motors mean no fuel, which of course means no emissions! Other eco-friendly features include rainwater harvesting, waste management and water purification systems.
The first Livable Yacht is now anchored of the coast of Miami and is available for short or-long term charter. For those looking to purchase a floating home the starting price starts from $3.5million a comparatively small price to pay for both a yacht & waterfront property
For more information visit: www.arkup.com
