The Urban Household Beehive

Like honey? Well, you’re in luck! The brainiacs over at the Dutch electronics company called Philips, have designed a way for urbanites to keep an active bee hive in their small apartments and homes with the Urban Beehive. The design was publicized as part of the company’s Microbial Home Design initiative which was unveiled at Dutch Design Week. The Urban Beehive aims to address the issue that surrounds the decline of the honeybee species as a result of pesticide use or a virus that attacks bees – now anyone can keep bees and harvest their own honey thanks to the sleek and modern hive design that is made to attach to a hole in an apartment or house window. How does it work? Well, the unit itself features a series of frames (that the bees will use to build their honeycombs) inside a super-modern-looking pod. The bees can access the pod from the outside of your house, and you get the benefit of watching the honey-making process through the pod’s glass facade. A small opening at the bottom of the pod is equipped with a hole that the beekeeper can blow smoke into (a process that calms the bees) in the event that the pod needs to be opened to harvest fresh honey – how sweet is that?

While there is a lot of criticism about the product’s design (and even more bashing from professional bee keepers who swear the process is flawed) we think the Urban Beehive is totally WHOA-worthy because of it’s forward-thinking concept that aims to help address a global species crisis. Plus, the pod-design is awesome – watching honeybees at work sounds like a lot more fun than staring at your puny ant farm, doesn’t it?