A lakefront living room

Located in the northern Italian town of Verbania, Camping Village Isolino extends over a 150,000 square metre panoramic green area along the shores of Lake Maggiore. For several years now, the owners have been making large-scale investments aimed at making the complex more competitive by renovating its facilities and equipment. This renovation project included the recent demolition and reconstruction of an existing building inside the camping site so as to create ten new housing units complete with parking spaces and solar panels. First constructed in the 1920s, the old building was subsequently extended and altered to cater for specific requirements. The resultant structure consisted of an ungainly cluster of volumes that lacked a unifying design. Moreover the thirteen apartments no longer satisfied the needs and expectations of guests. The new architectural complex consists of ten apartments, three fewer than before the renovation. The lakefront façade has remained almost unchanged, while the remaining façades extend towards the campsite, dividing the new building into a number of volumes. « The basic layout consists of two blocks with pitched roofs, arranged at right angles and joined by a flat-roofed connecting body, » explained Luigi Sacco, the architect from Studio Sacco & Associati who drew up the remodelling project. « The two white-plastered buildings feature terraces overlooking the lake and balconies on the side facing the campsite, mostly clad with strips of pale-coloured wood. Some of the parapets on the terraces and balconies are made of glass to lighten the visual impact. The volume connecting the two blocks was clad with the same type of stone used in the campsite architecture. » The two residential levels are built on a platform standing at a height of 198.50 metres above sea level. Below it, the open ground floor protects against floods with recurrence intervals of around 200 years and serves as a parking area for tourists staying at the facility. The buildings are highly insulated to optimise energy saving. Solar panels installed on the south and west façades also serve as a roof covering for the second-floor terraces. To make the most of the view of the lake from the daytime living spaces, the west- and south-facing sides are fitted with large windows which open onto the covered terraces, enabling guests to enjoy a large open space. To protect the privacy of the apartments and to differentiate between the façades, the windows facing towards the campsite are smaller than those overlooking the lake. The material chosen for the floor and wall coverings in the apartments and the common areas, Silver coloured porcelain planks from Cerim’s Wood Essence collection, makes a major contribution to the aesthetics of the interior.