Inside/outside: the interior façade as the stage of the architectural and urban in-between

Abstract

The archetypal figure of the enclosure represents the primordial action of inhabiting interior space: this construction creates an inside, as opposed to the outside, and at the same time defines a line (the enclosure) both imaginary and tectonic, that creates the threshold between interior and exterior, and the space of the intermediate and of the in-between. The façade, not only a line or a surface, has this role, containing the realm of the architectural scale and the urban scale, but also playing the role of a theatrical “fixed stage of the vicissitudes of man:” and this happens not only in the urban sphere (the street, the courtyard, the piazza) but also inside the building. Since Renaissance, in fact, theatrical action is staged bringing the outside world inside the interior. In theaters, the city is recreated inside the building as a montage of urban elements (e.g. the façade, the street, the square) that define the stage and the auditorium. Using this historical and theoretical framework the paper explores some contemporary projects where the montage and the reinvention of interior façades bring and transfigure the city inside the building as a stage for everyday life activities, practices, and rituals. These interiors are defined by thresholds and inbetween spaces both real and imaginary, ambiguous metaphors and allegories of openness, suspended between open and close, inside and outside, private and public.

KEYWORDS:

• Façade
• theater
• interior
• renaissance
• city

Notes

1 My Ph.D. dissertation at University Iuav of Venice focused on the theme of the “inhabited façade” in the work of Le Corbusier. Excerpts of this research, further developed over the years, have been presented at the 106^th ACSA Annual Meeting, in Denver (USA), in March 2018, and published in Martinelli, P.M., 2020. Inside the façade: the inhabited space between domestic and urban realms. Journal of Interior Design 45 (2), 55–75.

2 Prof. Weston presented her research “The Roman Theatre’s scenae frons as Thematic Edifice” at the Frascari Symposium V “Theatres of Architectural Imagination” (May 27–29, 2022), organized by the Faculty of Architecture, University of Manitoba and the Centre of Design, Université du Québec à Montréal.

3 The Porta Romana gate was built between 50 and 40 BC and was called Porta Jovia. Palladio surveyed and drew the gate: this drawing was used by Aldo Rossi for the reconstruction of the Porta Romana.

4 Just a sample, from Palladio’s Four Books (second book, chapter XVII): “I made the following invention at the request of the Count FRANCESCO, and Count LODOVICO DE TRISSINI, brothers, for a situation belonging to them at Vicenza.” About Palladio’s “inventions” see also Foscari 2010.

5 See “Invention” in Younés 1999.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Patrizio M. Martinelli

Patrizio M. Martinelli, PhD is Assistant Professor of Interior Architecture and Architecture at Northumbria University (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK) where his teaching and research focus on modernism, domestic and urban interiors, adaptive reuse, and the concept of theatricality of the interior. He studied and worked at Venice University IUAV where he earned a Master’s degree in Architecture and a PhD in Architectural Composition. His research has been published in monographs and journals (such as Journal of Interior Design, Architecture and Culture, Home Cultures, Interiority) and presented at several international conferences and lectures His creative work on collage and montage techniques applied in design and representation has been showcased in galleries and publications throughout Italy, UK and the United States. From 2017 to 2022 Dr. Martinelli taught at Miami University (Oxford, USA); he is a guest teacher at Münster School of Architecture (Germany) and taught workshops at BTU Cottbus (Germany) and the Escuela de Arquitectura, Toledo (Spain). Email: [email protected]