One of the most impressive repurposed military bunkers is the Bahnhof Data Center, built inside an old Cold War era nuclear bunker 99 feet (30m) below the surface of Stockholm, Sweden. When Bahnhof, a Swedish internet service provider, purchased the bunker, they decided that with such a uniquely eccentric location at their disposal, they might as well design it to harmonize with that, frankly, villainous ambiance.
Ed Peden (a schoolteacher) had drained the silo of decades worth of stagnant floodwater, shoveled out mountains of scrap and slag, and converted 604 square meters of the massive bunker into a veritable mansion, where he now lives with his wife. Their living space only encompasses a third of the entire site. Their whole house is underground except for a small sunroom on the surface.
Germany has many bunkers and bomb shelters and the German architect named Rainer Mielke is doing his part to contribute to a solution by recycling some of them into apartments.
The Tea House On Bunker in Vreeswijk, The Netherlands beautifully proves that bunker renovation doesn’t need to stick within the boxlike confines of the original structure.
The once-derelict tower sits on the picturesque coast of Suffolk, England, and for the longest time it was preserved by the English Heritage and Suffolk Coastal District Council as a national monument.
The best part about the home is that—except for the wooden lodge above it—the entire structure is underground. And like any good bunker, it was built to withstand a nuclear attack.
The massive underground space (7,000 square meters, or 75,000 square feet) was designed so that 3,000 military officials could survive for three months without resupply. Now, it’s a bar, club, and restaurant.
The Shelter is an underground nightclub that was built inside the framework of a 600 square meter bunker in the Xuhui district of Shanghai.
In 2010, Rietveld Landscapers cut through one of the remaining bunkers, Bunker 559 (there were 700 in total), giving tourists a cross-section view of the inside—a slice of history, so to speak.
The bunker itself is the square concrete block on the bottom of the picture above, and the recording studios are located in the section built on top of it.