Vyta Santa Margherita offers the oldest and most traditional product, bread and wine, in one of the most representative places for our society, Central Milan Station, the symbol of Milan’s hectic urban life.
”Through simple products offered by Nature, such as water, wheat and fire, thanks to man’s expert hand, patience and creativity, forms and savours, aromas and flavours have been created for millennia, giving birth to bread and wine, ancient and modern nourishment for humanity.”
This food philosophy was the starting point that inspired the architectural concept.
A contemporary look has been reformulated for the most “minimal” products on our tables.
It originates from a restraint design and an innovative, cool elegance, the result being a sophisticated minimalism and a formal reduction to the essential.
The project features contrasting materials and colours: oak and corian as representatives of tradition and innovation, an integration of nature and artifice. The juxtaposition of soft oak and black declined in its various material aspects creates an exclusive, theatrical environment, where the warmth of the natural texture is enhanced by the contrast with glossy black surfaces. These come up as corian for the counter and black polymer for all the vertical panels that fold the space like in a treasure chest.
The counter with its soft curved line, is a fluid shape emphasised by a roof made of curved slats, one of the most significant components of the setting, due to the shape and size of its natural oakwood planks that evoke the interweaving of traditional bread baskets.
The wall of the back counter, usually just a functional space, becomes a new form of entertainment through a video wall that reproduces a perpetual movie in slow motion that celebrates the ingredients of the products Vyta-Santa Margherita such as water, wine, olive oil, wheat, flour, mozzarella, tomatoes and fire.
The light system contributes to soft and intimate atmospheres: it diffusely radiates on the counter and enhances the wooden roof by indirect fitting of recessed metal halide light sources Minimal by IGuzzini, it is an eye-catcher on the black wall where the bottles of wine and their history are celebrate like sculptures by the backlit decoration realized milling thickness of slabs, it gets highly technological to celebrate bread and its derivatives through a cluster of LEDs.
The monumental atrium station has been brought down to a human architectural scale, through the creation of technological and custom made umbrellas, made of black metal they are equipped with infrared light with low energy consumption for heating, LED lighting, sound system and an electrical outlet to recharge smartphones and tablets, so that the space has a less monumental and more intimate look and at the same time the ensemble evokes the ancient rite of eating together, a less common practice nowadays, but increasingly necessary in the third millennium’s life.