Just a few meters from one of the most beautiful straights of the Renaissance defensive walls complex, within the compact urban structure of the historic center of Ferrara, an existing building from the early fifties reaches a bold new face through a surgery intervention of recovery and expansion. The consolidated architectural body, growing in height in search of a spectacular view of the horizon and leaving the traditional brick cladding, changes its skin, resulting in a material standing presence, simple and rigorous, with carved openings that meet the original layout geometry. Fields of color and tone variations, demarcated by three-dimensional carvings in the wall surfaces, stir the ingredients of the common language of urban housing, and give the elevations a taste of contemporary, while retaining the building, protected by the laws of the Architectural and Environmental Heritage Office, an elegant and austere character. A large covered balcony at the top floor, defined by a transparent wall of glass, frames the view of the walls. From the inside, rooms and spaces seem like floating among the trees.

Chronology: 2010 Project, 2011-2012 Construction

Category: Residential, private house

Project: Tomas Ghisellini, Alice Marzola

Structures: Beatrice Bergamini

Photographs: Tomas Ghisellini