Exemplifying Style – Suites and Apartments by the Sea

It all started with a real estate developer’s dream. He envisioned the project as the resurrection of a hypothetical pre-existing art nouveau structure. 

This structure was not visible. However, it could not be excluded that it had actually existed in the past. 

In the 1920s and 1930s, in fact, the promenade of San Benedetto del Tronto was lined with Liberty villas (which is how the art nouveau style is known in Italy), which were replaced in the 1960s with reinforced concrete hotels. 

One of these, the Sabbiadoro Hotel, was the object of our transformation project. 

We decided to accept the challenge and to experiment with mixing two different architectural languages: the floral language of art nouveau and the minimal language of the modern movement. The languages are substantially coeval, as both were born more than 100 years ago. 

We undertook research to identify how to balance the commercial needs of the real estate developer and the functional needs of those who would live there with the architectural and urban requirements. 

The two languages are represented in the project on two different scales. On the urban scale, minimalism prevails, while on the scale of the promenade along the seafront, the structures are more decorated. 

The building was a great commercial success and popular with the public.