Casa BRSL

Manufacturing experience, passion for architecture and attention to detail are the key themes came out from this collaboration between two generations of professionals. The use of heterogeneous design tools was at the base of this fruitful experience: render, technical drawings, sketches,.. but the most peculiar expect was a large use of freehand design for every detail, not just in preliminary phase but in the executive one as well.

“Casa BRSL” is a two-centuries-old building with a complex history behind: it was at first transformed into a laboratory for clogs' production, later into a shop and today this restoration brings the building back to its first function: a family house.

The building is composed of two blocks, one nineteenth century old and one twentieth century old and, owing to the extremely variable heights between floor levels, the blocks re-stitching was a very delicate phase: the new steel staircase was designed on minimum thicknesses and it becomes the project cornerstone as well as the fulcrum of the domestic life.

During restoration the main structure was laid bare, interventions and alterations on brick walls and wooden ceilings appear as “based on need overlapping”: some steps have come back to light, old brick-stone works were revealed as well as a majestic chestnut timber beam that bears the main building base.

Extensive glazing look towards the private courtyard and the window details were studied to have a perfect alignment between wall and glass, that makes constructive boundaries almost disappear in a visual and emotional permeability: the feeling, getting close to the windows, is like to be outdoors “you can stand in the rain or observe the rush of the storm without getting wet.”