International Business Centre and Intercontinental Hotel | Paolo Cucchi

The design strives for a language of harmony between architecture and natural setting. The complex blossoms discreetly from a prominent location, on top of the hill. Wrapped by a light veil of greenery, the development, fully integrated with nature, offers from its elevated platform, an iconic view, legible from all points of the city: the high visible organic presence reinvigorates the location.

The form adapts itself to the topography of the site, amplifying with dynamic elasticity the shape of the area and the mass rises as vibrant, open-air amphitheater that enhances the attractiveness of the center, as undisturbed and regenerative escape.

A plant-covered illegible metal grill, as vertical garden, surrounds the  proposal, playing a mimetic fusion with the context. The vegetal skin, besides offering a barrier against strong winds, displays a scenographic impact. Residence and hotel’s blocks, separated but contiguous, run one after the other with the fluidity of their sleek curving forms. Although they remain autonomous, they break the idea of rigid sections, in the aspiration to encourage interaction and save privacy to the network of different programs.

Both amenities and facilities are interwoven into a wide green lawn. An internal sequence of generous green patios blur the boundaries between interior and exterior. By car the guests arrive into an enclosure of modernity and nature: the feeling is to live the privilege of a splendid isolation, merged in the most sophisticated relaxation, few minutes from the city. Careful environmental analysis of climate conditions, winds and seismic stability has provided sustainability features, incorporated throughout the project as well as low-impact passive energy strategies.