Casa Skuppin

Municipality of Castell´Umberto
Nebrodi Mountains, Sicily
2003-2005
Completion of outside facilities 2007

Client: private
Commission: HOAI §15, LP 1-5

Local site supervision and statics: Silvio Pruiti, Rocca di Capri Leone
Photographer: Marcus Bredt, Berlin

Collaborators: Jana Schmidtzberg, Elena Kossovskaya, Susanne Glöckner

The structure of this summer house in the Nebrodi Mountains of northern Sicily responds to its prominent hillside location as well as to the severe local building regulations. The latter require a roof pitch of 30° and the division of the building into housing and a barn.

The concept aims at exploiting the approvable volume to the limit. While the ground floor with the living hall (barn) is organized on an axis between mountain and valley, the bedrooms upstairs are oriented perpendicular to that and offer views of either Mount Etna or the Aeolian Islands.

Simple materials and traditional techniques were used. Floor tiles, bricks and roof tiles are products of a local brickyard. The house is built with an earthquake-resistant structure.