The Hive Apartment, Melbourne

JournalDesign

The Hive Apartment, Melbourne

Moody apartment debuts the 'hip hop building' concept...

Bling. If you sat an infinite number of 50 Cents in a room with a load of crayons for an infinite amount of time and told them to design an apartment, they probably still wouldn’t come up with anything as bling as this. If they re-shot Scarface for the modern day, this would be the set on which Montana introduced a lot of rival henchmen to his Little Friend.

Designed by ITN Architects’ Zvi Belling and veteran graffitist Prowla, The Hive, in Melbourne, Australia, is anything but a place for drones. Blending in and doing what you’re told is not what this hive is about. Standing out from the surrounding architecture, the building is rather like the reproving slap from a calf-skin glove; creamy but sharp.

I could tell you about The Hive’s eco-friendly features, but if you live here chances are you’ll be pulling up in a car that does 3mpg, so we’ll just say it’s a place to hang out and look fabulous. Where’s that butler with the Cristal?

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Photography, Zvi Belling