ITALY

“Glenn Murcutt was one of the architects who made me fall in The lighter, white first floor, which almost seems suspended, is love with architecture,” Subissati says. “His houses are ‘rough’ and more sheltered and contains the private rooms. Small refined at the same time, with the spaces integrating with the kaleidoscopic windows with mirror-lined sides present intriguing environment.” Yet this house is no Murcutt clone. Subissati’s work optical effects, magnifying the landscape according to the distance is also informed by the Italian Radical design movement of the late from which the viewer looks. ’60s and ’70s, as well as his own poetic creativeness. This level also features what the architects refer to as a “hybrid”

“Border Crossing House follows a construction principle where area that functions as an additional living space and includes a the individual parts remain legible, as in a building game kit,” he plant-filled winter garden. Open plan, it is roofed by a light frame says. “It’s a complex simplicity.” with a perforated and pre-tensioned membrane that appears

For their first home, cardiac surgeon Carlo Zingaro and scrub translucent from the outside during the day but is transparent from nurse Eugenia Morgano briefed Subissati and his colleague Alice inside. At night, it glows enchantingly like a lantern. Cerigioni to create a two-storey house for themselves and their Details such as the staircase and upper walkway balustrading two young children within a large green belt. are fabricated from chicken wire to provide maximum

On the wishlist were three bedrooms and two bathrooms, with transparency without resorting to glass, and to continue the one incorporating a hammam and the other a micro pool. The two leitmotiv of materials that are simple, basic and not overtly on floors were to be connected via a prominent staircase, and there trend. The duo of colours – red and white – that distinguishes the were to be views from the first floor down to the ground floor two main sections of the building continues inside. The interior across to an outdoor lap pool. contains only minimal furnishings, and the white-stained ash

The architects, who work between Milan and Ancona, sourced cooking zone and bathroom vanity are freestanding. the land and then Subissati designed a linear, semi-transparent “Being detached from the perimeter walls makes for a different residence running from east to west, covered by an asymmetrical, style of space management and closely links with the philosophy of double-pitched roof. the project: borderless, uncluttered and with an ease of

“It’s a light, flexible space that appears as if it had always been circulation,” says Subissati. there, just like the buildings in the rural tradition of my As with Murcutt, sustainability is a priority for the architect. ALESSANDRO MAGI GALLUZZI grandparents – rustic places where people both lived and worked,” says Subissati. “The long and compact form allows a simultaneous vision of the two sides of the ridge from any point; it symbolises the border, a threshold to be crossed. This, and exploration of permeability, is the main theme of the project.”

The building can easily be traversed at more than one point: from the patio entrance, from the living area and from the bathroom/spa. Downstairs, on both external and certain internal walls, zinc-coated iron cladding is painted with an anti-rust primer. “Tools and agricultural vehicles are traditionally painted in this red colour,” Subisatti says, adding that as a further link to the pastoral landscape, perennial grasses were planted to envelop the exterior.

The barn-like house is composed of three parts. The ground While the area’s climate is mild for most of the year, summers can sometimes be extremely hot and winters very cold. With inclusions such as double glazing, concrete flooring downstairs (and underground water tanks), the house is thermally efficient in all seasons, providing for thermal gain in the colder months, and a natural cooling system thanks to cross-ventilation and a chimney effect for the hottest days.

Architecture sans frontières

In an agricultural region of central Italy is a ‘playful’ house inspired by the work of Australia’s Glenn Murcutt

Italy

JUDY BAROUCH house deep in the agricultural Le Marche region of central Italy. transparent and engaged with the external environment. Air flows Yet this is where the acclaimed University of Florence-trained freely through nine doors that open on the south side, and through architect Simone Subissati created Border Crossing House, on a six on the north side. They’ve been designed in conjunction with a small, fenceless ridge overlooking a picturesque, hilly borrowed riblike pilaster system that is structural but also metaphorical, landscape of neighbouring fields cultivating everything from splitting the building to provide a chiaroscuro effect that conceals wheat and barley to sunflowers and olives. the glass and allows the doors to remain open without obstruction.

floor with its double-height living spaces is the most open, visually Y ou wouldn’t expect to find a Glenn Murcutt-inspired

Subissati stresses that this was never meant to be a luxury home, although it does provide all the contemporary amenities. “We wanted a playful house that extends beyond all the conventional rules,” he says.

And with Italy in the grip of COVID-19, for these medicos, their rural sanctuary provided a most welcome retreat.

Clockwise from above: Chicken wire balustrade of the upper walkway; the barn-like house in its landscape; the lap pool; kaleidoscopic windows on the first floor; the minimally furnished, double-height living space on the ground floor