In addition to offering refreshments and snacks, the stilt houses now also provide beachgoers with greater comfort and safety on the beach. Additional stilt houses have been built—for lifeguard stations, beach chair rentals, changing rooms, and restrooms. In the multipurpose stilt house at Ording Beach, you’ll also find an information point run by the Wadden Sea Conservation Station.
Wooden beach huts
In St. Peter-Ording, the stilt houses are as much a part of the town as the sand is to the sea and the fresh breeze is to the North Sea—and have been for more than 100 years. The seven-meter-high wooden houses on stilts are not only a true landmark of the town but also unique along the German coast. There are stilt houses along all of our beach sections.
1
Stilt Houses on Land
6
Stilt House Restaurants
13
Stilt houses on the beach
4000
piles washed up on the beach
From the poison shack to today's stilt house
A Long Journey
In 1911, the first stilt house, the “Giftbude,” opened its doors in St. Peter-Ording. The name is derived from a low german expression. It refers to the North German custom of always having “een gifft”—that is, typically drinking a shot of schnapps—after taking a dip in the North Sea waves. Social gatherings and lively celebrations quickly took hold at the first Giftbude.
Stilt House Restaurants
Six
There are six stilt house restaurants in SPO that serve up delicious snacks, meals, and refreshments for their guests. Here, with the best views of the North Sea and the beach, you can dine and, when the weather is nice, enjoy the North Sea air and beautiful sunsets on the terraces.
LOTTI on Südstrand
© TZ-SPO
Salt & Silver at Böhl Beach
© TZ-SPO
Herring Gull at Ording Beach
© TZ-SPO
54° North Beach Bar at Ording Beach
© TZ-SPO
Noah's Ark at the Bad Beach Section
© TZ-SPO
© TZ-SPO
Practical
Multipurpose Stilt House
Witnesses of the Times
Our wooden beach huts
Not every stilt house could withstand the relentless and sometimes rough North Sea waves. Storm surges and high tides repeatedly took their toll on the larch-wood beach huts. The storm surge of 1935 brought down the first stilt house, the “Giftbude” on Ording Beach. Nearly 40 years later, a new stilt house was built on the same site.
True to the saying, “You’re always wiser in hindsight,” these painful experiences taught builders to adjust the thickness and height of the stilt houses so that the structures could withstand the forces of storm surges and ice drifts. In addition to the piles driven into the ground, diagonal piles were installed. These contribute to stability and help ward off ice floes.
© TZ-SPO
Erlebnis-Hus
The First Stilt House on Land
Since June 2023, there has also been a stilt house behind the dike. The Erlebnis-Hus is located on the Erlebnis-Promenade in the local district "Bad" and is our family-friendly stilt house in St. Peter-Ording. There, you can look forward to a Spiele-Hus, a 47-meter-long slide, an information center, an outdoor playground, and many viewing platforms.
An Overview of Our Stilt Houses
Nice and woody
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