{"id":1098,"date":"2025-07-28T10:30:30","date_gmt":"2025-07-28T10:30:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.angesfinanciers.org\/?p=1098"},"modified":"2025-08-01T15:09:50","modified_gmt":"2025-08-01T15:09:50","slug":"fontego-architettura-converts-rural-florentine-barn-into-space-efficient-home-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.angesfinanciers.org\/index.php\/2025\/07\/28\/fontego-architettura-converts-rural-florentine-barn-into-space-efficient-home-2\/","title":{"rendered":"F\u014dntego Architettura converts rural Florentine barn into space-efficient home"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Exterior<\/div>\n

Italian studio F\u014dntego Architettura has converted a\u00a0former barn<\/a> near Florence into Fienile N, a compact house<\/a> with geometric window screens and mint-green cabinets.<\/span><\/p>\n

Renovated for a young couple, the two-storey barn is part of a cluster of buildings built across the 19th and 20th centuries in the countryside west of the city.<\/p>\n

\"First
The former barn is now an 80-square-metre home<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With no doors or windows, the barn needed significant repairs.<\/p>\n

F\u014dntego Architettura<\/a>‘s overhaul involved adding these alongside new sub-foundations, as well as reinforcing the timber structure and replacing the roof and floors.<\/p>\n

\"First
Green joinery organises the first-floor living spaces<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The owners wanted to keep the first floor as open as possible, exposing the preserved roof trusses and leaving the outer walls untouched.<\/p>\n

This led studio founders Francesco Busi and Francesca Romano to give the 80-square-metre house an upside-down layout, placing a bedroom, bathroom and walk-in wardrobe on the lower level.<\/p>\n

\"Kitchen
These cabinets provide a kitchen, storage and a toilet<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Fienile N’s first floor houses the living and dining spaces, characterised by tall mint-green joinery. These free-standing cabinets organise the space, providing a kitchen, storage and a toilet.<\/p>\n

The staircase slots in behind the cabinets, separating the building entrance from the living spaces.<\/p>\n

“The biggest challenge was managing the multiple features of the upper floor,” co-founder Francesco Busi told Dezeen.<\/p>\n

“In about 40 square metres, the goal was to nicely place six areas: entrance, kitchen, dining area, living room, bathroom and storage space. The green volume made the job by working both as a container and a divider.”<\/p>\n

\"Green
The green colour echoes the surrounding landscape<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

According to Busi, they chose the colour to pick up the tones of the surrounding greenery.<\/p>\n

“The colour was obtained by mixing all the greens of all trees and plants around the barn, from the greyish shade of olive trees to the dark and brilliant tone of cypress,” he said.<\/p>\n

\"Green
A staircase slots in behind the cabinets<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For the window screens, F\u014dntego Architettura reinterpreted the region’s traditional mandolato \u2013 a type of terracotta-brick wall with a perforated honeycomb pattern, used to provide ventilation in rural Italian architecture.<\/p>\n