Villa Lugano, Carona

The arrival of reinforced cement has ousted the centuries-old tradition in Switzerland of very thick walls made of stone, a raw material which is abundant in the region located north of the Italian Alps, which is almost completely covered with mountains. As a consequence, the ways in which concrete is expressed, trying to achieve a minimalism which can sometimes be exaggerated, have largely silenced the wide range of technical and aesthetic solutions available, for example by assembling ashlar stone, and by the concatenations between them created by overlapping horizontal lines. This residence, with a view of the Lugano lake, uses stone again for the exterior of the buildings, concealing the cement structure with natural material - meaning that cement is only used in the structural role it was designed for, with the aesthetic-formal role being taken care of by the stone. Stone has been chosen for the outer shell of the new buildings, as if to reflect the surrounding mountains, using the same material as they themselves are made of. The rough finish accentuates the idea of the restoration of nature, an idea pursued by the designer. Remaining outside, slabs are laid on the ground to reproduce the geometry of the wooden staves on the terraces, but laid according to a design that is very controlled and orthogonal compared to the scene inside. As a reflection of what the ceilings and floors try to achieve inside with a reinterpretation proposed outside, several Pietra Forte Fiorentina ashlars surround a private covered swimming pool, and climb up the surrounding walls in square-format slabs, made continuous this time by traditional cement joints instead of open joints. The use of sandstone in this project is completed by several regular custom-made furniture elements, in the large external space reserved for the garden.