The Letters On The BOTEL Roof Are Actually Hotel Rooms

Photography by MMX architecten

MMX architecten, together with Jord den Hollander and other interior designers, have completed the “Letters,” a group of additional hotel rooms, that have been placed on the roof of the BOTEL, which is a floating hotel in Amsterdam.

Photography by Marcel van der Burg

MMX architecten’s description

“How can you improve the look of the hotelboat, in order to make it fit in with the dynamics and creativity of the NDSM wharf, in the north of Amsterdam?”

Photography by Marcel van der Burg

This was the question that Botel-owner Sandra Chedi put to MMX-architecten (Arjan van Ruyven & Michiel van Pelt). Together with filmmaker and architect Jord den Hollander they developed a bold plan. Five 6.5 -meter-high hotel rooms in the shape of huge toy letters make up the silhouette B O T E L on top of the ship.

Photography by Marcel van der Burg

The white hotel boat has been given a cheerful crown, referring to the chimneys of the ocean liners that used to come off the now derelict NDSM slipways.

Photography by Janiek Dam

For the interiors of the letters MMX came up with the idea to challenge several designers. Richard Hutten designed a half-pipe in the B, Ronald Hoofd (&Prast&Hooft) was inspired by the book L’ Histoire d’O for O and architect Moriko Kira turned the L into an oasis of calm. Designer Jord den Hollander made the smallest cinema of the Netherlands in the E, and MMX-architecten saw in the top room of the T the captain’s quarters of Botel.