Project: Villa in Sicily
Architects: DAP Studio
Location: Piedimonte Etneo, Sicily, Italy
Area: 968 sf
Photographs by: Lamberto Rubino
Villa in Sicily by DAP Studio
DAP Studio has designed the Villa in Sicily project located in the Piedimonte Etneo comune in the Italian region of Sicily. This luxurious villa has been designed as a single-story dwelling with just under 1,000 square feet of living space but all of its interior is masterfully designed making the most out of its area. Additionally, it expands outwards to a landscaped yard and a beautiful swimming pool with endless views.
The project for this one-story living space, with large windows that open onto nature, is located in the fascinating landscape of north-eastern Sicily, between citrus groves and lava ash. The design intervention initially should have only consisted in the renovation of the external areas surrounding the main house in the center of the vast agricultural property. In addition to this, a few tens of meters away, there was a swimming pool to be completed, resting on a partially underground tool shed.
Hence the suggestion to enhance this seemingly secondary area and transform it into an outbuilding, into a space for living and hospitality. An intimate refuge and an observatory on the landscape. The fusion between architecture and nature is the basis of the project, few elements with an essential design have the function of defining an interior space that maintains a strong visual and material continuity with the surrounding landscape.
The result is a small house resting on the hillside, with a rooftop swimming pool and large windows that open onto the surrounding countryside. The rearward position of the windows generates a covered patio bordered by sunshade panels which, thanks to a sliding, rotating, and folding system of the modules that make up the structure, can close, partially filter the light with different inclinations or open completely. The technical compartment serving the swimming pool (which adjoins the living space) is delimited by a fixed cladding in vertical strips which integrates with the sunscreen system in order to generate a continuous front.
The living space is continuous, with a few elements that define the different functional areas in a fluid way, the living and sleeping areas are filtered by furniture elements and sliding panels. Few materials have been used internally that echo those present on the outside: wood as wall cladding and in the slats of the false ceiling; the lava stone covers the back wall, in continuity with the external dry stone walls; the gray grit floor, echoes the gravel present in the garden.
