Turning Recycled Oil Tankers into Floating Villages

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Oil tankers get a bad rap. They are the Justin Biebers of the ocean. Mostly because we rarely hear anything from them, then when we do, it generally makes us cringe. Usually they’ve tipped over and spilled oil on all the penguins or something. (Clearly the similarity between a tanker and Bieber ended before the tipping over part.) But just like James Corden who has recently been accredited for rejuvenating Biebs’ reputation, Dutch designer Chris Collaris wants to recycle The Black Gold, a revamped oil tanker he wants to turn into a floating village.

Collaris saw the rapid expansion of the Arab states thanks to their monopoly over the oil industry as problematic. With new sky rises being built on the daily, entirely funded by the fortune that other countries are willing to pay for the highly guarded resource from the planet’s most oil-rich nations, Collaris decided to turn the trend on its head. And what better way to send a message than to take an abandoned oil tanker, the very cause of the problem, and recycle it into a sustainable village in the Southern Gulf?

The concept has a road running from the mainland, through the hull of the ship, before reconnecting with the coast. The double steel walls act as a climate buffer and keep indoor temperatures under control, even during the hottest and driest months in the Southern Gulf. Proposed ideas for the recreated space include a museum or exhibition center, an events center and a massive shopping complex. But the space offered by the oil tanker is so vast that it is possible it may accommodate all of these.

And if that weren't enough, the architect behind the whole initiative, Collaris, wants a fully operational village to inhabit the ship, which will be sectioned off into apartments with a pool on the deck and a walking track around the perimeter. We propose a Beatles remix, "We all live in a recycled oil tanker."

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