Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Italian architects DAP Studio added a perforated aluminium tower to this former chapel in the Italian town of Lonate Ceppino, converting the entire building into a public library.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

The Else Morente Library, which opened in 2009, was first constructed as the Oratory of San Michele: a two-storey chapel with an ornamental facade of symmetrical pilasters and intricate detailing. For the renovation, DAP Studio decided to restore these features, then replace an existing stair tower with another that would be more sympathetic.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

The architects designed a two-storey extension clad with perforated panels to match the light render of the old building. The upper storey of the volume is tapered inward, so that it pulls away from the overhanging eaves of the restored roof.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

“The challenge was to respect the historical building but also to [show] its new public role with a contemporary element,” architect Elena Sacco told Dezeen. “The new volume has not only an architectural value, but it also allowed us to clear the historical building of the functional and potentially invading elements.”

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

An entrance corridor with a glass roof connects the two structures on the ground floor, while an enclosed wooden bridge branches across at first floor level.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

“The relationship between the two volumes has a subtle nature, made of alignments and visual connections,” added Sacco.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Toilets and archival areas are located in the extension, allowing the library shelves and reading areas to take up the entire ground floor of the renovated building.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

The library is divided into four sections and includes a reading room, a study area, a newspaper library and a children’s section. High ceilings allow room for tall shelving systems, comprising a stack of modular wooden containers. These containers are also piled up to make desks.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

A multi-purpose room occupies the first floor and can be used as an exhibition room or a conference hall.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Milan-based DAP Studio more recently completed an office interior inside a former factory in Turin. See more architecture and interior design in Italy.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Other libraries we’ve featured include one that appears to float over a shallow pool and one that appears to be clad in translucent marble. See more libraries on Dezeen.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Photography is by Luigi Filetici.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Here are a few words from DAP Studio:


Elsa Morante Library

The pre-existing building for the new Lonate Ceppino Public Library already belonged to Lonate Ceppino’s historical heritage. On a rectangular plan, the two levelled buildings housed the civic library on the ground floor, while the first floor had been left unused. From the outside, the main entrance façade has a higher decorative part which is independent from the roof structure. This façade stands out further on the building gutter line and laterally its design suggests the idea of an unfinished bell tower. In this case, neither the bidimensional outline has a counterpart in the interiors. A few ornamental elements mark the façade hierarchies. The design of the fronts is organized in horizontal bands at different heights while on the north, south and west fronts a system of vertical pilasters apportions the windows on both floors. The east front lacks any decoration and, before the intervention, it was badly compromised by a recently built volume for the service rooms.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

The intervention aimed to restore the historical pre-existing building and to adapt the new building to its re-gained functional use. Being inadequate, the previous service’s volume extension was removed together with the internal stairs, which were damaged and not according to laws. The project restored many areas injured by dampness, plasters, floorings and roofing.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Besides the east front a new well balanced volume has been built, including bathrooms, archives and technical systems. This last choice allowed to clear the historical building out of the functional and potentially invading elements, minimizing any demolition and making the facility rooms easier to share.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

The new volume’s architecture is marked by a narrower profile on its top, with a sloping side that restrains to give more space to the historical building pitches. The dialogue between the volumes is the key and main theme leading the whole intervention. The relationship between the two is nourished by juxtaposition between matterness and lightness, solidity and instability, opaque and reflecting materials.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Above: site plan

The highlighting of differences underlines the peculiarities of both volumes, in a mutual figure-background relationship. The two buildings are connected through a glazed roofed little volume. The entrance is on the left side and a further wooden connection goes to the first floor.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Above: ground floor plan – click for larger image

The library hall is divided into 4 specific areas: a conference area with a little newspaper library, the children’s area, the bookcases’ and the reading tables. On the first floor there’s a flexible room for exhibitions or conventions.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Above: first floor plan – click for larger image

Inside the new volume space reduces while climbing upstairs. After the first floor a platform drives you to a little space lit up by a window on a corner. This spot is the zenit of the specific spatial sequence developing inside the building.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Above: section one – click for larger image

The interiors are monochrome, with a resin floor and enamel walls. The stairs and the white metal platform have durmast steps. Lighting is provided by a pattern of incandescent lamps.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Above: section two – click for larger image

Inside the historical building the floor is in durmast too and the original roof has been restored. The wooden bookcases are designed as modular aggregations, able to be assembled at different heights and exhanged.

Elsa Morante Library by DAP Studio

Above: section three – click for larger image

Client: Lonate Ceppino Municipality
Project: Dap studio Elena Sacco Paolo Danelli – www.dapstudio.com
Structures: GB. Scolari
Facilities: M. Piantoni, A. Bronzoni
Contractor: Gruppo Edilia
Interior Furniture: Habitat Italiana

The post Elsa Morante Library
by DAP Studio
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Sempla offices by DAP Studio

Clean white walls contrast with the stripped-back columns and beams of these offices inside a former factory in Turin (+ slideshow).

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

IT company Sempla asked DAP Studio to design an office with a variety of open and private spaces.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

The architects chose to retain some of the factory’s industrial characteristics by leaving its structural skeleton exposed.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

The bright white walls, desks and furniture provide a strong contrast with the existing building.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

A ceiling-height white box houses a meeting room, while a tall cylinder provides a smaller private workspace.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

The rest of the room is divided by screen walls decorated with perforated dots, which echo the patterned holes in the chairs.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

We recently featured an office in London with a dark tunnel leading to the boardroom and another in Paris where the walls, shelves and desks are made from piles of modular blocks – see all offices.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

In a recent opinion column, architect Sam Jacob called for an end to the “tyranny of fun” in office design – read more opinion on Dezeen.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

Here’s some more information from the architects:


The Sempla offices in Turin are housed in an old factory that has been transformed. We decided to crystallise and preserve the traces of the past and its degradation, enhancing the power of the contrast between the new and the old.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

The thing that strikes you when you enter this office is the very strong, constant but delicate, dialogue that is established between the remnants of the factory’s past and the new identity that has occupied the space with its new way of working and its objectives.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

This silent interchange marks the passage from the industrial world to the advanced tertiary economy, fully representing the transformations underway and largely having already occurred in the city of Turin. Sempla is a company that deals with Information Technology. It is a system integrator that is active throughout Italy with resources of over five hundred people.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

They needed to structure the space in such a way as to have “private” areas, such as meeting rooms, and freer “public” areas configured as open spaces, where the prevailing logic, instead of an assigned place, would be flexibility in terms of capacity and distribution of activities.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

So what they needed, more than a “traditional” office was a place that functioned as a base camp and mainly a meeting area. The project sought to respond to these multiple needs, creating a space with barriers, more logical than physical, that allow us to maintain their way of working while reducing disturbance among the various teams.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

We conceived large open spaces within which we could integrate more private areas, imagined almost as the sites of work performed by distinct and separate entities, as “other” places that could respond to particular needs of the work team. In the end, the plan was not based on the design of the work station, the chair-and-desk, but rather on the construction of relations.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

Above: floor plan – click for larger image

Walking around the office, one has the feeling of being in an urban landscape in miniature with all its open and closed spaces, social spaces and private spaces. And this is a very powerful image. We started with the intention of creating a sort of labyrinth in which the meeting points were unexpected, something to be discovered with each new encounter. Naturally we thought about a hierarchy of paths, separated on the basis of dimensions into principal and secondary routes, as is typical in a city.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

Above: section AA’ – click for larger image

However, we also wanted those who lived in these spaces to be able to choose freely, according to their personality, needs, and desires, what path to follow, without showing them a predetermined route. During the design phase we dedicated a great deal of attention to creating variability that would favour this process because all the random or subjective choices of pathway may lead to unusual or unexpected meetings between people who may belong to different teams. This is something which we feel represents an essential factor for Sempla.

Sempla Offices by DAP Studio

Above: section BB’ – click for larger image

A fundamental part of the work is based precisely on dialogue and the exchange of ideas. The pathways intersect strategic meeting points which, on the spatial level, generate an “exchange of energies”, intermediate areas that are distinct from strictly working spaces, spaces which facilitate dialogue and informal relations.

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by DAP Studio
appeared first on Dezeen.