A DAY IN ORVIETO + STUDIO PROJECT

Ciao tutti! I am really excited to share this post with you. For my first semester Studio Design class, we have a semester long project designing a site located in Umbria in the city of Orvieto. We visited the site towards the beginning of the semester and I found it to the one of the most inspiring and peaceful places I have ever been to!

PREMISE OF MY STUDIO PROJECT

This by far is the most exciting and interesting project I have ever worked on. Since the project is all semester long, it is split into three sections. The first part, we designed the interior for a two level apartment in the large main house. The second part is creating two rental apartments from the ground up, designing both the interior and exterior. Lastly, the third part is the landscaping connecting the two buildings together.

ORVIETO

We took the train from SMN directly to Orvieto around 9 am and got there around 11. We road on a little cable car up the side of the mountain to reach the top. Then we went directly to an original well consisting of 400 steps down to the water. It was incredible to see and definitely made my gelato later worth it haha. After, we took a bus into the city and my professor gave us tour of three historical projects he had worked on. Then we went to the Duomo di Orvieto, where Michelangelo studied before he completed the Sistine Chapel in Rome! Afterwards we had a nice break and went to lunch at a cute little spot with a hidden garden. We met back up with our professor and walked to the project site. We took the very very scenic route through the brushes and bamboo tress down the mountain. When we reached the house, I instantly felt as if I was in a movie. The property was so incredible. The only thing on the property right now is the empty house. We walked through the house and the design possibilities were endless!! We spend an hour recording all the elements of the house, as well as the untouched exterior that would soon be another building and landscaping. We were able to meet the owners of the property and they were a super sweet couple from Rome. After the sketching the surveying the site, we got to explore the nature around the property. I drank from the running stream on the property and ate the delicious figs on the trees!

I'd definitely recommend visiting this charming little city and sampling their famous white wine!

Much love,

Gabriella

Part II to this post will be my designs for the project!