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INTERIOR & DÉCOR, but with a twist

A step inside the house of Alfonso Femia

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Alfonso Femia, creator and founder of Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia, designs and develops his projects inside an atelier that combines three cities – Genoa, Milan and Paris – where a multidisciplinary team crafts a unique dwelling for architecture and thought. Through a guided tour inside the spaces of his home studio in Genoa, Alfonso Femia has browsed through the themes closest to his heart, telling Medelhan about his relationship with space, time and with the city of Genoa.

"The choice of places has meaning to me. Genoa, Paris and Milan – the cities Alfonso Femia has chosen as headquarters of his architecture studio (ed.) – are consequential to a notion of travel. Along the way you need berthing places where to slow down and depict the moment. Genoa is the city I leave and to which I return. Genoa is the city of equilibrium and contradiction. In order to understand me you have to visit my studio in Genoa. Its way, the space, the city, everything speaks about me".

Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy <br /> Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini
Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy
Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini
Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy <br /> Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini
Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy
Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini

You teach us that every space belongs to a specific narrative dimension. What does the entrance of your house in Genoa communicate to those who enter it? 

Personally, I consider the sequence of entrances leading to the house more significant than the single entrance. I am referring, in particular, to how I reach that space and what I encounter before the fateful moment of the entry. Speaking of my Genoa home studio, before reaching the entrance door, I come upon Garibaldi Avenue and, immediately after, I enter an internal courtyard that articulates the sequence of approach to the architectural volume. What really counts to me, however, is the twofold threshold. Indeed, whether I enter the house or I enter the studio, a perspective opens up to me. Climbing up the ladder to the house, I find an apparently narrow corridor that plays by reflection with mirror elements and, in turn, heads to a window of cinematic camera framing that brings you back to the city. This also applies to the studio, where a series of rooms drives you to an external perspective, namely the garden. To me, the wonder is not the ‘whoo’ you pronounce in front of the bizarre, but rather the way the space compresses and expands, the way the light enters and, finally, the way you touch the material, always having a visual goal that guides you. This is how I think about space. When you enter a place and visit a physical world, you always experience – and this is what I care the most – an imaginary world, that everyone may interpret as he wishes. This is part of the imaginary realism by which I read the space around me. 

You define Genoa as the city of equilibrium and contradiction. In which elements of the house the historical identity of Genoa emerges? 

Genoa has always lived its history as a constant search for harmony and coherence between two dominant territorial elements, namely the Mediterranean Sea and the Apennines. Indeed, situated on a narrow strip of land, Genoa has had to plan every square inch of space. The apparent contradiction stands in Genoa’s desire to do more than what the territory, at first, could suggest. It is one of those rare cities where the sequence of palaces becomes the city itself and this is, finally, the reason why I can live in this extraordinary space, a fourth floor majestically overlooking the city. This state of equilibrium and contradiction is total and transversal, as it applies to the architectural elements as to the surrounding urban spaces. For example, you could simply descend from Garibaldi Avenue towards Piazza Meridiana in order to find yourself in a different world. It is something extraordinary happening within a few centimetres and in this apparent contradiction lies, to me, the great beauty of Genoa and its capacity to be eternally contemporary. Genoa is a city that you hardly love, it seems chaotic and unreadable. And then, you fall into it and you feel comfortable in it, after all. 

Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy <br /> Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini
Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy
Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini
Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy <br /> Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini
Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia studio, Genoa, Italy
Image copyright: @Stefano Anzini

You consider the windows the most significant architectural element of the house as they describe the connection between intimate and collective dimension. Which openings to the outside define this relation in your house?

To me, windows are notes on stave. Where most people banally see an opening, I see a means of imagination. Personally, I have a passion for rooms with multiple windows as they describe the change in the light incidence and, at the same time – perhaps this comes from my passion for cinema – a cinematographic dimension of shots. Turning to my house, the first things you notice coming down the narrow corridor are two adjoining rooms – a large open kitchen and a living room – conceived as a single space jewelled by six windows overlooking the city. From there you may admire Genoa as a whole or, getting closer to a certain window, you may focus on the opposite building lit by a curious sunlight. This is what I seek in every place, that is a dimension appearing as external and nevertheless defining your narrative. Everyone thinks it is a purely compositional issue – and it is – but there is more than that. I feel comfortable in my rooms because they comprise an idea of suspension despite being within a building. I often find myself in a state of suspension between the palaces of Genoa, their roofs and the sky. This could seem banal, but to me it is education to beauty. Therefore, windows are fundamental. The very term window does not do justice to them. 

Which room holds your innermost essence?

It really depends on the time of the day, on how I feel and who I want to be with in that moment. It is about the identity of the room, rather than the room itself. In my projects I never determine a core room or a pre-established path, because every space should nourish the other as every room should anticipate the other. Every little space in my house is part of a whole that makes me feel comfortable. However, I could answer you that there is a specific room full of books, a mattress on the floor and a large sofa. Here time slows and I can transcend into reading, writing, movies or dialectical moments.

Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP <br /> Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni
Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP
Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni
Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP <br /> Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni
Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP
Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni

Would you tell us the story of an object you are particularly fond of?

I would say that every object retains a story and that I am fond of what it communicates in time, rather than its being. However, here it is a personal one. Many years ago, before our logo recently became a whale, I got a blue ceramic whale from an artist friend. It is an object I keep somewhat hidden in a room. What matters is the imagery behind the whale, namely that unconscious thought that slowly comes to focus. Indeed, when I describe a project, at first many clients do not understand where I am going with it. Nevertheless, what might appeared to be disconnected, eventually becomes a whole, held together as a whale tail. What I would say, however, is that I am more fascinated by space, empty space indeed. I do not have a particular affection for material objects as there is not a single item that can make me feel better or that I need. Conversely, I cannot accept to stay in a space I do not feel contented with.

You have always said that every project is necessarily tied to time. Which timelines intertwine in this project?

The city lines are tied to it. If I turn my gaze to the north, for example, I see the 19th century city, while if I turn to the west the 16th century city opens up to me. Finally, at north east I can admire a more contemporary architecture. There is a time in the city that corresponds to you and tells you that you belong to time. Then, there is a time bound to space. There are spaces that might remain independent and constantly unchanging, others that are layered, covering centuries of architecture. There is something very human in this. An Augustinian idea of time belongs to me, that is that time is a sum of present moments and not continuous sequences. And my house, my spaces, they say this.

Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP <br /> Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni
Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP
Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni
Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP <br /> Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni
Rialto Luxury Apartments, Venice, Italy, THDP
Image copyright: @Giorgio Baroni

In architecture there is a constant ‘passing of the torch’ between past and present. Do we find this theme in the Genoa project?

Because space is, to me, rhythm and sequence, this theme is necessarily reflected in my Genoa house. The long narrow corridor has, indeed, its own identity and autonomy. Then, it ‘passes the torch’ to a bright space with multiple windows, thus describing two extremities, an intimate area and a collective one. These spaces pass the baton to each other, with the possibility of reading them as a unit or as a sequence of closed boxes. Space is not a matryoshka doll with many souls, each containing the other. Space is rather a single, living organism, an element of synthesis, of feeling and narration. The ‘passing of the torch’ is many things, it is a fraction of infinite time where you may find the individual, the other, the object and the story. My architecture is not based on a repetitive, predefined language, that is a style, a modus operandi that I respect, but it does not belong to me. What I want to communicate is, instead, the fact that every project carries a story, a challenge and a question. This is why I believe that our projects can and should be passed on, that they can be a return to reflection. For some years now we have been going back to old projects with a young photographer, in order to understand what route they took, how the city has changed around them and to understand if they work. Time is a matter of design and this is a way to remain tied to time. Finally, all this is architecture and there is a theme that goes beyond aesthetics.

A recent hot topic – aided by the pandemic – has been the rethinking of spaces and their internal division. How do you imagine the house of the future? 

This is a sensitive issue, as there is a strong resistance to change from the sector responsible for building residences. I think that two things should responsively take place. Firstly, more generous spaces should be designed. Indeed, the general trend in recent years has been that of ‘drying it up’ until a state of indifference and asepticism. It is not necessary to build much larger houses, but we must take into account the new dynamics, the social moments and the private ones, that may consist of a video call or a study session. Secondly, we need to go back to the other great quality and breathing resource, namely balconies. To all this, another important theme should be added, that is that of the city before the house. Public spaces, services and buildings hosting functions that cannot be performed at home should be a priority in order to get back to an idea of community. If we do not start from this concept, that is from thinking that, in addition to its natural beauty, the city is born out of the need to establish relationships, and therefore we do not go from the city scale to the apartment scale, we are making the biggest mistake.

Image
Alfonso Femia, Founder of Atelier(s) Alfonso Femia
logo-ateliers-femia.jpg
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