We
will call our client Emma for discretion’s sake and also to maintain a certain
emotional distance.
Emma inherited an apartment from her father, the house
where she lived when she was a girl and where her mother continued to live until
ten years ago.
Even when the whole family was
there, the apartment was too big for the four of them. Emma’s father filled it
however, by throwing fabulous parties and hosting family reunions. Its worth saying,
for those who don't know the history of the city, that Palermo in the sixties
was extremely different from how it is today.
After the war it experienced a prolonged period of incredible economic
growth. People invested heavily in their homes and to secure their children’s
future. Emma's
father was no exception.
After her mother left the
apartment, Emma didn't know what to do with it. After almost fifty years the
city had radically changed. The fuitina (young
girls escaping from home to marry someone deemed unsuitable by the family) didn't
exist anymore. The birth rate had declined and sons, if any, were staying at
home until their 30’s. Being single was in fashion.
For a whole year Emma alternated FOR SALE and FOR RENT signs on the building's entrance gate without any positive
response. The apartment was too big for an average family yet too expensive to
be bought and refurbished. People were seeking smaller, easy to maintain flats
and compact, multifunctional spaces.
Through all this Emma came to the
realisation that she never really wanted to sell her parent's house. Not having
sold it during that year was simply destiny. What happens next is already history:
Emma asked us to transform the apartment so that it could easily be rented.
The original apartment is located in an early forties block with a
structure of load bearing walls and steel concrete floors. It was built along
classical lines and composed of large adjoining rooms connected by a long
corridor. The kitchen was a separated room with an adjacent small dining room.
We solved the problem given by the
sheer size of the apartment by dividing it into three smaller units (35, 70,
110 sqm) thus giving the owner a range of units suitable for different types of
tenant (singles, young couples, families. Finally easier to rent! Additionally
the fully investment cost could be recovered by selling the smaller property,
if required.
We turned the old entrance
room into a new shared access area for the three units. The new layout is
designed so that each apartment has at least one balcony. Once the perimeter of
all the units was defined, we worked on subdividing the interior space to
maximise the light and to introduce new functional elements. We used modest
materials to obtain a strong graphic effect.
Small
apartment (area: 35 sqm)
This apartment is a small open-plan space
connected to a generous outside space in the form of a balcony accessed by two
large French doors.
The
bathroom, wardrobe and kitchen run neatly as a single unit running along two walls.
The unit is made of a timber and metal structure covered with a lacquered MDF
skin. Along the kitchen area the skin retracts showing the structure and
lightening the unit. The floor is covered with an industrial parquet.
Middle
sized apartment (area: 70 sqm)
Two blocks placed in the centre of a
narrow space divide the living room from the main bedroom. The bigger block
contains the kitchen, which faces the living area, and a bedroom. The smaller
block houses two symmetrical bathrooms divided by a blue glass partition.
The blocks are made of plasterboard
and the floor is covered with a bi-chromatic parquet in natural and white
painted oak. The bi-chromatic floor pattern, pales from natural wood in the
living room into mainly white in the corridor, darkening again into mainly natural
wood in the bedroom.
Large
Apartment (area: 110 sqm)
The main challenge in this apartment
is its long corridor which connects the entrance to the living room. To
minimise the uncomfortable sensation of a long and unpleasant walk we inserted
four asymmetrical blocks containing the bedrooms, bathrooms and kitchen. To
visually reduce the long-distance effect and highlight the access points of the
different spaces, we partially tilted one of the faces of each block. Finally,
a series of holes add texture and roughness to the blocks’ surfaces and double
as light guides at night.
Built
surface: 215 sqm
Construction
cost: 150,000 euros
Client:
Private
Project:
Massimo Tepedino Studio
Collaborators:
Mitana Aleksandrova, Marina Cella, Polina Kurovskaya
Photos:
Alberto Moncada
Furniture:
Oji, Spazio Deep, Palermo
Artworks:
FPAC Francesco Pantaleone Arte Contemporanea
Artists:
Adalberto Abbate, Manifesto; Stefania
Galegati, Gli scienziati; Francesco
Simeti, Stampa; Christian Frosi, Foto di Palermo.