Virgil unbound: Italian Alps ruin becomes dream budget home

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Author: Kirsten Dirksen

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When his wife inherited a ruined stable in Italy’s Orobic Alps, architect Alfredo Vanotti reinvisioned the space as a family home, reflecting local craftsmanship and his love of modern design. To daylight the home, Vanotti created a long skylight and four large windows facing the Valtellina Valley below. To create exterior walls that resembled the “dry stone” technique of the the region’s traditional homes, he used local stone and a minimal amount of cement to hold it together. For the interior, Vanotti used reinforced concrete, along with natural larch and iron to give the home a more modern feel. “Concrete is misused,” he explains. “It shouldn’t be perfect. The advantage of concrete: it shouldn’t be smooth, beautiful, precise.” The fireplace, sink, bidet, shower and toilet are all custom-designed from unfinished concrete. To showcase the material’s imperfections, Vanotti chose to leave the material untreated and uncovered. “Concrete is a refined material. You don’t have to hide it.” With just a “small budget”, and relying on help from his father, Vanotti transformed the ruin into a weekend home for his family over the course of five years. He designed the home from the ground up, including the kitchen sink. Everything was designed by the architect, including the concrete sink/bidet/toilet and fireplace. Nearly every detail was personalized, like the door/cupboard handles made from strips of leather. EV+A Lab: http://www.alfredovanottiarchitetto.it/ Original story: https://faircompanies.com/videos/6656/

Comments

He's messed up a little with the fireplace, the looks have definitely overtaken the functionality, too much width along the wall but does make a good centrepiece.

Try remodelling in there and you will need huge concrete smashers! Some things in there look like he's trying too hard, like the leather for the doors. If you do that have a second knot at the end of the chord so there is something to pull on. But in all very nice house and i love the staircase. I've seen it done before on grand designs and I'm sure that'll be more common in the future.

Beautiful

beautiful

VERY NICE BEAUTIFUL VIEW

basta aggiungere la parola " AD HOC " ogni tre per due per sentirsi interior designer. bha.! siiii dai sacrifichiamo la sicurezza di mia figlia pur di avere un parapetto dalle linee pulite ed essenziali. Per me bocciato a prescindere. prima la sicurezza poi il costo contenuto, l'ecosostenibilità , e il grande impatto visivo, ecc ecc.

Wow! What a place!!! The views and vision!! Thanks for your work in bringing this home to us, you do amazing work!!!

So his aesthetic for the staircase was more important than his daughter's safety? This man is so full of himself for designing this place. He mentions several time that he designed it. But I would not want to stay there. It looks cold and uncomfortable and totally out of place with the nature surrounding it. Instead of making it a welcoming and comfortable place to get away for his family, he made it more of a test of endurance to stay there. How long could you put up with rough concrete everything and all that cold metal and hard edges? No thanks. I would make him stay alone in this testament to his pride. See how long he can stand his own ego before he goes completely mad.

beautiful

Wow..... How do we get the blueprint plans...?????

The most attractive part of the house is the man. ;-)

Gostei das visitas feitas a casas maravilhosas, parabéns pelo trabalho...

wtf so DOPE

I found it beautiful. The light is great, esplly the skylight and how it plays with the surfaces. I loved the raw concrete as an idea for the bathroom walls. The iron staircase is awesome and certainly a lot cheaper than a wooden one. The concrete toilet and bidet, if you think about them from the point of view of a house without running water like many old farmhouses, is a half-step above and spares us the sorry view of the traditional porcelain.
I loved the faucets, straight from the farmers'hardware store. There is so much choice in this area that the best way of solving the problem was to go for the plainest design, in accordance with the raw concrete.
Now I'm reconciled with concrete! The fireplace in particular is beautiful, I never thought a concrete fireplace could look so good. Only reservation is that it's placed between two windows and a lot of the heat it produces gets lost. It would have given more heat on a solid wall.

Thanks for posting Kirsten, all your videos are so interesting! I was just trying to figure out where his electricity comes from? I didn't see solar panels and this place must be too remote to be on the grid. Please let me know.

Beautiful would be a understatement

how do you sit on the toilet when you want to poop, it looks uncomfortable to sit on

BELLA!

Very beautiful home