A villa that projects towards infinity
Built by the Milan-based architectural studio MYGG on the site of an old ruin, designed primarily for outdoor living with views of the Gulf of Alassio
A ten-year-old dream of a retreat to mark a new stage of life has finally come true, a spectacular stage on the Island of Gallinara overlooking the Gulf of Alassio, an example of modern Italian architecture that bears some resemblance to Villa Malaparte on the Island of Capri. The villa that Ville&Casali is proud to present exclusively to its readers, designed by the studio MYGG of Milan by the architects Giovanni Feltrin, Gerardo Sannella and Yolanda Velasco, can be defined in many different ways. The story begins like this: “For about ten years, a couple from Turin have been looking for a plot of land on the Italian Riviera on which to build a holiday home. They finally found a ruin measuring around seventy square metres perched on Alassio’s highest hill and bought it. Thanks to new building rules, we were able to build a much larger villa”, recalls the architect Gerardo Sannella. The architect continues: “Secluded amongst the olive trees, on a high podium overlooking the Gulf of Alassio, was a very romantic ruin in which a tall fig tree had spontaneously grown undisturbed over the years, gradually spreading throughout the house and condemning it to a state of disrepair. The design of this house was based on the idea of building on the footprint of the existing house but adding a fully-glazed section running the length of the home. A closed cube pierced by just a couple of openings, and a parallelepiped open to the spectacular Ligurian landscape surrounded by olive trees, terracing, dry stone walls and the sea.” The house is arranged over two overground floors and an underground level built into the stone. The living room, kitchen and dining area extend beyond the physical confines of the house to become a diving board to the infinity pool. The hugely important landscaping was entrusted to the renowned landscape architect Paolo Pejrone.