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LUIGI MORETTI
VILLA LA SARACENA

Photographic reportage of La Saracena designed by the architect Luigi Moretti in Santa Marinella (RM).
Even if the villa has been documented in a state of decay (the photos have been taken on March 2017), it is now
object of an architectural restoring.

Photography by Emiliano and Lorenzo Zandri (ZA²).

PHOTOS BY LORENZO ZANDRI , EMILIANO ZANDRI / ZA²

PUBLISHED ON OCTOBER 25,
2017

LOCATION
ITALY - SANTA MARINELLA

DESIGNER
LUIGI MORETTI

PROJECT YEAR
1957

PHOTOS BY
LORENZO ZANDRI ,
EMILIANO ZANDRI / ZA²

ATLAS OF ARCHITECTURE

BEACH HOUSES
DINING ROOMS
! LORENZO ZANDRI ADD TO COLLECTION FORGOTTEN &
INTERRUPTED
La Saracena was commissioned to Luigi Moretti by Francesco Malgieri, journalist of INDOOR STAIRS
Corriere della Sera, for her daughter, Luciana Pignatelli d'Aragona Cortez. It is an‐ INSIDE MODERNISM
nexed to the so-called unfinished triptych of Santa Marinella, comprising the Califfa ITALIAN HOUSES
and Moresca villas. ITALIAN MODERN
The yard began on 1956 and finished on December 1957. HERITAGE
MODERN HERITAGE
OUTDOOR STAIRS
PRIVATE INDOOR
STAIRS
ROMA
SPIRAL STAIRS
THE FIFTH FACADE
VILLAS

PUBLISHED ON

DIVISARE HOMEPAGE
JULY 24, 2018
OCTOBER 25, 2017

ARCHITETTURA ITALIANA
HOMEPAGE
OCTOBER 27, 2017

DIVISARE JOURNAL
JULY 16, 2018

! LORENZO ZANDRI ADD TO COLLECTION

The villa extends its length following the shape of the lot, which gives it the main axi‐
al: from one side, it is close to the road, to the other one, it is opened to the sea,
looking for a visual contact to the Mediterranean landscape.
The sequence of the spatial dynamic grows in plan, according to the rhythm
scanned by the central gallery, which represents the symmetric axis of space distrib‐
ution.

! LORENZO ZANDRI ADD TO COLLECTION

The entrance to the gallery is from the street, through a narrow entrance opening
into an elliptical patio, the "vestibule" of the villa, where the whole composition and
the plastic architectural expression are perceived.
Once inside the house, the sleeping area - divided into two levels - is on the left of
the main gallery; while, on the right, the living area and the services are found.

! LORENZO ZANDRI ADD TO COLLECTION

Centrally, from one side, the gallery suggests the entrance to the external garden
and, on another one, is leading to the main big room, throughout a thiny membrane
of modular fixtures and a circular space entering into the stubborn linearity of the
gallery itself. Behind that, there is a private open space, on which the services are
organized.
The general structure is an expression of the time in which Luigi Moretti was work‐
ing, characterized by the continuous research about the human mechanisms, and
the expression of Michelangelo and Borromini‘s compositions.

! LORENZO ZANDRI ADD TO COLLECTION

Inside the house, the walls produce emotional qualities: they have a load, a tapered
design with the decrease of loads, as a support and spatial force of space. The
compactness of La Saracena's building, carefully pursued in an execution aimed at
avoiding any sign of resumption of plaster - preceded by various tests, with cretons
of various granulometry – is made in order to create a single building.

! LORENZO ZANDRI ADD TO COLLECTION

The material shrinks in the side of the patio to "counteract the pressure of the out‐
side world", and then is dilated almost to disappear to the sea, where it can go, ide‐
ally, toward the infinity.
The form is thus becoming structure, while the space the conquest against the op‐
position of the world.
The descendant way to the seaside reveals a further space: the natural one, com‐
posed by the grotton, which was highlighted by dynamic gate and designed by the
American artist Claire Falkenstein, actually ruined by time.

! LORENZO ZANDRI ADD TO COLLECTION

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