Reader's home of the month
This month's £150 Habitat giftcard goes to lindsaydglasgow's 'terrace on a teeny budget'...
Slick attic apartment
A Milanese apartment set within a converted country house…
After more than a decade living a fast-paced life in Venice, lighting designer Pier Lorenzo Salvone was looking for a change. As luck would have it, his parents had just decided that their family home, where Pier and his siblings grew up, had become too much for them.
'The perfect solution was to convert the house into three apartments,' explains Pier, 'one for them, another for my brother Umberto, who runs the family vineyard, and the third for me.' Even better, there was enough space for him to have a studio on the ground floor.
Pier, who initially studied architecture, designed the conversion. 'My parents built the house on the edge of the village 40 years ago and it was typical of a Seventies rural Italian home – very dark, with lots of wasted space,' he says. 'It's surrounded by countryside, so I planned to open it up, fill it with light, and create a balance with the outside.'
With plans in place, the family employed a team of builders from the village to work on the renovation (which, in reality, turned out to be more like a re-build).
As soon as his parents moved out, Pier moved in, virtually camping in the house for the next two years. 'I wanted to be on site to keep everything running smoothly,' he says. It clearly paid off, as the house is now three beautiful, independent homes.
Take a room-by-room photo tour around Pier's light-filled flat to see the results of the conversion.
Find out more about Pier's work at saffroninteriorarts.com.
'The perfect solution was to convert the house into three apartments,' explains Pier, 'one for them, another for my brother Umberto, who runs the family vineyard, and the third for me.' Even better, there was enough space for him to have a studio on the ground floor.
Pier, who initially studied architecture, designed the conversion. 'My parents built the house on the edge of the village 40 years ago and it was typical of a Seventies rural Italian home – very dark, with lots of wasted space,' he says. 'It's surrounded by countryside, so I planned to open it up, fill it with light, and create a balance with the outside.'
With plans in place, the family employed a team of builders from the village to work on the renovation (which, in reality, turned out to be more like a re-build).
As soon as his parents moved out, Pier moved in, virtually camping in the house for the next two years. 'I wanted to be on site to keep everything running smoothly,' he says. It clearly paid off, as the house is now three beautiful, independent homes.
Take a room-by-room photo tour around Pier's light-filled flat to see the results of the conversion.
Find out more about Pier's work at saffroninteriorarts.com.
