KOLLEKTIVER

Kollektiver ("collectives") are Danish housing arrangements, where individuals or families live together and share chores such as cooking and cleaning. Originally designed for university students and oddball hippy types at the end of the 1960's, they have proved surprisingly resilient. Today, almost 200,000 people live in them, between 3-4% of the population.

Indeed, the numbers are rising, up from 170,000 just four years ago. Apart from students, the main group of people using them are families with small children. Stitching together a busy daily life, in which both parents work and commuting is getting ever longer, is easier if those parents can take it in turns with others to fetch children, cook the evening meal and/or do other things. While ownership, the great fad of the noughties, has lost some of its appeal, particularly if it is associated with debt.

Researchers believe that numbers will keep on rising in the future. Some kollektiver are also likely to become more luxurious, with someone employed to maintain central facilities/look after security etc, a bit like a janitor in a New York apartment building. As with many other things, what started 50 years ago as a rebellion is now becoming mainstream.

Walter Blotscher