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Architects: Clinicaurbana
- Area: 620 m²
- Year: 2015
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Photographs:Valentino Nicola
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Manufacturers: De Longhi, alpewa
Text description provided by the architects. REPAIR WORK
Certain Alpine constructions are built according to the same principles that we seek to apply in architecture today.
We aim to preserve and pursue the functional, essential character of their building methods and aesthetics, especially when dealing with renovation.
For that reason we feel “repair work” can well sum up Clinicaurbana’s approach to renovation in this field.
CONTEXT
The restoration of “Casa Gianìn” forms part of a larger project involving several rustic buildings in the village of Coi in the Zoldo valley in the Dolomites.
These buildings make a substantial contribution to the appearance of a typical man-made Alpine environment. They are a precious testimony to the usages and practices of a vanished way of life, inviting us to design in a way that cares for what is extant.
PROJECT
The project takes the form of “repair work” both to buildings and landscape.
The object of the renovation and extension was to create three completely independent residential units.
The original stone-built house has been entirely preserved, eliminating all the more recent additions, and restored to its status as a significant village ‘landmark’. The newly-built extension is independent both in form and function.
The new building reinterprets the established pattern of rural architecture in the valley: a larch-wood structure with lattice-work openings built over a stone substructure.
Product Description.
As with the old tabià, the exterior cladding is in untreated larchwood.
Larch was chosen since it can improve with age, both in technical performance and in appearance, reducing the need for non-routine maintenance to a minimum.
Larch is thus the main material used in construction, readily available in the valley and prepared by a local workforce familiar with all the secrets of these materials.
Concern for sustainability not only covered the material aspects, for example by making use of low-impact construction technology, but also the entire construction process, including socio-cultural aspects and the promotion of traditional local craft skills.
