IKEA's ingenious affordable housing system

Built in a quality-controlled factory, delivered and assembled in a day. The BoKlok (pronounced Boo Clook) housing concept, a partnership between property company Live Smart @ Home and Swedish furniture giant IKEA is only months away from bringing the average UK family a stylish, efficient and affordable housing option.

The first BoKlok site in the UK will be in Gateshead following the local council’s decision to sell the company a site at St James - opposite Gateshead International Stadium - and a planning application was recently approved.

Live Smart @ Home, which is part of leading non-profit affordable housing provider, Home Group, is planning to construct over 90 flats and houses to be marketed under the BoKlok brand. BoKlok - first pioneered in Scandinavia by furniture giant Ikea and construction firm Skanska - provides space-saving, functional homes offering good quality at a price which enables as many people as possible to afford a comfortable home.

The concept is based on customers’ real needs and wishes, a safe environment, roominess and access to green space. The state-of-the-art, Scandinavian-style timber framed properties will be primarily aimed at households earning between £15,000 and £35,000 a year and will be sold on an outright sale or shared ownership basis.

The BoKlok flats have a flexible open-plan layout, high ceilings and large windows, giving the apartments a light, airy and contemporary feel.

If planning permission is approved, it is expected work will start on site in early 2007 with the first flats being marketed in Ikea’s Gateshead store in the Autumn on 2007.

Alan Prole, Managing Director of Live Smart @ Home, said: “Receiving planning permission is a significant step in the process and it brings the UK’s first-ever BoKlok properties even closer to becoming a reality.

“We will now be looking to begin work on site at the earliest opportunity, with a view to marketing this unique and affordable properties to local people in the autumn.

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