Page 136 - AIT0919_E-Paper

VERKAUF UND PRÄSENTATION • RETAIL AND PRESENTATION

Marmorstreifen ziehen sich vom Eingang durch alle Flurbereiche. • Marble strips from entrance through hallway.

Bis hin zu den Bädern sind viele Räume original erhalten. • Many rooms are original, even the bathrooms. . Ein Durchbruch in den Küchentrakt war der größte Eingriff. • The major intervention: a passage to the kitchen.

T he film “I Am Love” from 2009 was not only a further climax in the career of dential ensemble by Portaluppi from the 1930s in the Milan city centre has also
been publicly accessible! It is Casa Corbellini-Wassermann, whose construction
Tilda Swinton; at her side, the architect Piero Portaluppi (1888–1967) also made
it into the international limelight. His Milan Villa Necchi Campiglio, built in the early started in 1934 and where today the exhibition- and office premises of the gallery
1930s for a wealthy family of industrialists and preserved to this day in its original owner Massimo De Carlo are located. The original building clients were the engi-
condition, was the secret star beside Swinton. Since then, the building, which has neer, university teacher and politician Guido Corbellini and his wife Paola Wasser-
been used as a museum since 2008, is being practically overrun; and the architect mann, heiress of a significant Italian pharmaceutical company. In contrast to Villa
– formerly only known to experts in the North-Italian modernism – today enjoys real Necchi Campiglio, Casa Corbellini-Wassermann was not designed as a free-standing
cult status in the profession. That the re-discovery of Portaluppi more than 40 years residential building but as a five-storey town house in the Città Studi university di-
after his death is owed solely to the Hollywood appearance of his villa, however, is strict. As to the typology, the building is a combination of a villa and an apartment
not quite correct. Rather, ten years ago his architecture also came upon a changed block. Thus the ground floor and the first upper level were used by the Corbellini-
zeitgeist and a newly awakened interest in the so-called “ambiguous figures” of mo- Wassermann family as a prestigious and spacious residence – the base area of each
dernism. Thus Portaluppi’s buildings with their flat roofs, unornamented façades storey is close to 600 square metres –, whereas the second and the third upper level
and oversized glass surfaces on the one hand clearly show the constructional and were each divided into two rentable residential units. The flat on the fourth upper
formal insignia of classic modernism; with their noble wall panelling, opulent stucco level was originally intended as a bachelor apartment and, to this day, has direct
ceilings and abundant marble intarsia, however, they reject the ascetic ideals of the access to the generously dimensioned roof terrace. The most striking element was
period. This makes a clear stylistic classification difficult and is the special appeal the spiral staircase made of natural stone in the garden-courtyard of the house
of Portaluppi’s architecture at the same time! which allowed direct access from the first floor reserved for the children and the
servants onto the dining-room terrace on the ground floor. The staircase had, by
The building combines a villa and an apartment block the way, originally been part of an ephemeral pavilion for the Milan Triennale of
1933, which Portaluppi had designed together with then still young and unknown
Since this spring, in addition to Villa Necchi Campiglio and Casa Boschi di Stefano BBPR architectural office. After the pavilion was demolished, the staircase was
likewise having been used as a museum for some years, a third outstanding resi- moved across the city to Viale Lombardi.

136 • AIT 9.2019