When Art Meets Home | Dutch Mountain

August 22, 2017

Some architects create buildings that could be displayed in a museum, but to sell a whole house as a work of art at a famous gallery is exceptional. GRIMM Gallery (Amsterdam & New York) and the world-renowned Sotheby’s International Realty brand are joining forces to place this unique, sustainable house on an international pedestal.

Just a stone’s throw away from Amsterdam, on the edge of Huizen and in the Gooi Nature Reserve, lies one of the most unique houses in the country. Hidden in the woods, nature is embracing the building.

The hill containing the partly-subterranean house belonging to Sanne Oomen, Lucas Mol and their children is known locally as Mol’s Hoop – a play on words that references both the Dutch term for molehill and the hope for a greener future. In the international press, the house is called Dutch Mountain. Last year, France’s global channel TV5 showed a documentary about the house and earlier this year, a crew from BBC TWO visited the house to record an episode of “The World’s Most Extraordinary Homes.”

Experience previous one-of-kind home spotlights on the Extraordinary Living blog

Eight years down the road from the initial plans, the owners and creators think the time is ripe for a new project. This self-sufficient house is still ahead of its time. The creative couple, an architect and an art historian, wants to go even further.

With their creative and humorous take on building and building materials, they manage to use things that no one else would to create a state-of-the-art, but still timeless, interior. This, combined with the owners’ collection of acquired or created art and design, often made from recycled materials, means the house fully embodies the term ‘Gesamtkunstwerk’.

The 30-year-old Daimler Double Six, which the owners drove around in for years, had to “die” to further their green dream, and has since been immortalized as a kitchen cupboard by nailing it to the wall. The luxury car hangs on the wall like a painting and is a gift to the new owners. The other custom-made furniture would also rather stay where it is, as would the bantam hens, family of foxes in the woods, the owls in the garden, the pair of buzzards, the woodpeckers, hawfinches, goldfinches, seven squirrels, two moles, and eleven bee colonies.