The Vietnamese Tube House: The Unique Architecture of Vietnam

Every country reveals its architectural identity through its temples, its historic buildings and its houses, which are often a reflection of the local way of life. In Vietnam, it is the « Vietnamese tube house » that arouses visitors’ interest. Characterized by its narrow, elongated shape, this traditional architecture surprises and intrigues: why do Vietnamese houses adopt such a singular structure? In this article, we will explore the origin and the practical reasons behind the Vietnamese tube house, a true symbol of adaptation to the country’s economic and cultural realities.

What is the tube house?

If you spend time strolling around Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi or any other city in Vietnam, you will undoubtedly notice these houses. It will be very easy for you to understand what tube houses in Vietnam are. It is a house with a narrow facade that develops upward in height. Each house is attached to the next as shown in the photo below; here you can count no fewer than seven houses side by side.

Today’s tube houses are seen with 1, 2, 3, or 4 stacked floors, and it is for this reason that you can find such tall houses standing side by side in the streets. Vietnamese tube houses built with traditional structures are now particularly popular in Vietnamese cities.

How did the tube house come about?

When you travel around Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City or other cities, you must wonder why the Vietnamese apply this architecture to the design of their houses. To understand it, you have to go back to the era of French colonialism in Vietnam; rumor has it that housing taxes were calculated according to the surface area of the facade.

So narrowing the facade turned out to be a good solution for reducing taxes, which explains this type of traditional architecture. However, Vietnamese tube houses are still used today because of people’s practical needs.

In the modern era, when cities are very dense and land prices are continually rising, finding enough space for a large number of people is really important. As a result, the stacked floors of tube houses can be a preferred option for providing rooms to many people.

In general, these houses do not have gardens; many families grow vegetables and flowers on the terrace. Indeed, the houses are right next to one another without any obvious separation.

One floor for each generation

You undoubtedly know that the Vietnamese often share their house with several generations. This culture of living together, typical of Vietnam, has many advantages. There is the happiness of being together and helping each other; the grandparents take care of the grandchildren. And the adult children take care of their elders.

However, this situation does not have only advantages; in fact the close quarters can also cause a few fits of temper!

The Vietnamese tube house is therefore designed to ease this type of inconvenience. Inside, tube houses are clearly divided into distinct floors, each with a bathroom and a bedroom. This design ensures privacy while allowing the family to remain united. Often, each floor is used by one generation. The eldest will be at the bottom, to spare them from climbing the stairs.

The kitchen, the ancestors’ altar, and the tea room remain shared, often on the ground floor.

Typical architecture of tube houses

The features of Vietnamese tube houses represent Vietnamese insight and flexibility, their ingenuity in making good use of the land resource. Even though the structure of tube houses is not something so extraordinary, what makes them special is that they have become a typical architecture that has existed since ancient times, reflecting the Vietnamese way of life to this day.

A typical tube house design is from 2.5 m to 5 m wide, with a length that you can also consider as the depth of the house, which is 5 to 8 times greater than the width. The surface area of a normal tube house is often around 25 square meters. A closer look at the internal structure reveals that the floors are intended for different spaces, so if people want more, they can stack more floors. The ground floor can be a garage, a rented office or a living room, but there is always a space for the family members. At the center of the house there is an air well that ventilates the rooms, which you can easily observe by looking at the design of the house.

In addition, Vietnamese tube houses can now have a tile or concrete roof. The Vietnamese also use the flat concrete roof to create a small rooftop garden of vegetables or flowers. And to create more space and a chic design inside the house, mezzanines are also used. Mezzanines are like intermediate floors that are inserted into floors with high ceilings. The Vietnamese also take the stairs into consideration when building their tube houses. Not only are the stairs considered the backbone of the house, but they also play a crucial role in ensuring the safety of families, especially those with children. Because of the small space, the stairs in tube houses generally have many turns.

In Vietnamese superstitions, the stairs are also arranged according to Feng Shui since they are thought to be bridges that lead the spiritual air up and down. There should be no gap between the steps because they can put children in danger and disperse the good air. Moreover, in Feng Shui, the number of steps is important for creating a good structure for the house, since each step is thought to be parallel to each stage of the cycle of life: « Birth, aging, illness and death ». The stairs should stop at the « Birth » stage, and it is best to avoid ending at « Death » on the last step, which can spiritually affect the family members.

Commerce

The Vietnamese tube house perfectly embodies the entrepreneurial spirit and pragmatism of the Vietnamese. Indeed, many of these multifunctional dwellings use their ground floor as a commercial space. Whether it is a grocery store, a cafe, a restaurant, a hardware store, or even a cobbler’s workshop, every tube house becomes a practical and accessible point of sale. This versatility makes the tube house a model of urban adaptation, where private life and professional activity coexist harmoniously.

Conclusion

Tube houses in Vietnam have been transformed to help people adapt to modern times, but it is undeniable that they have not preserved the entire old version. Nevertheless, the exceptional architecture has inherited the typical structure of the houses of the past. And the architecture of the dwelling can be considered a pride of the Vietnamese, since it reflects well the way of life of the people and Vietnamese culture. Anyone who loves culture and architecture should take the time to discover these beautiful features of tube houses just to see how special they are and to admire the clever design they possess.