Design
International design and innovation office, Carlo Ratti Associatti (CRA) uses a Ficus tree as the fulcrum of a progressive residential design in Parma, Northern Italy As the first step of CRA’s 2017 winning master plan for Mutti, a tomato company, which calls for a closer integration between nature and the built environment, the designers present a project that disrupts conventional demarcations between rooms and floors; offering instead a stepped-plan that breaks away from a stereotyped typology. The under-renovation farmhouse stands with its program organised around a 10-metre-high Ficus religiosa growing within the main living area. Using a stepped format, encircling the tree, a sequence of interconnected rooms give rise to six domestic spaces – three above the entrance, three below it - each dedicated to a specific activity viz., practicing yoga, listening to music, reading, eating together, sharing a drink, keeping a wine cellar and storing dry cured ham for aging. Each s...

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