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I fell in love with canal houses since the first day of my Amsterdam trip this may, and started designing it next morning after return. I did my best to keep all the distinctive features of a canal house. First off all, you can notice that the canal houses are narrow and deep. They were designed so to minimize taxes, which, at that time, depended on the width of facade. Amsterdam is situated on a swamp land, therefore facades were built of light bricks with large windows to reduce the weight. Another interesting feature with windows is that they become shorter from ground floor to the top. This makes an illusion that building is higher than it actually is. Also note some kind of a plaque just above the door. Three hundred years ago, only small percent of people could read, and plaques helped to identify name or profession of the owner. Because canal houses were built narrow, staircases were also narrow, making it a big problem to take furniture and goods up. To solve the problem hooks were placed on the top of the house, allowing to lift what you need and pass it through the window. Red bike. Thanks to many factors, like flat terrain, narrow streets and desire to decrease car-accident deaths Amsterdam became one of the most bicycle-friendly cities in the world. Nowadays there are more than 400 km of bike paths and 1 200 000 bicycles (even more than citizens). About 100 000 of them are stolen each year, and therefore our bike is securely locked. Pls support this canal house on Lego Ideas: https://ideas.lego.com/projects/83275 (You could also find there story behind the building and more pics, in higher quality)
