#COMMERCIAL ARCHITECTURE PROJECTS
Timothee Studio's Unconventional Design for a Tuscan Trattoria Looks to 1970s Italian Discos for Inspiration
Founded in 1785, Cristiano Filippini’s butcher shop in Castelfranco di Sopra, a medieval town in Tuscany, roughly halfway between Arezzo and Florence, has been an integral part of the area’s history and local community for over two centuries. Most proprietors would be happy to preserve the status quo as long as they could; not the Filippini family, whose hands the ‘antica macelleria’ has been in for three generations.
Passionate meat lovers, they have just opened Il Ristoro di Cristiano Filippini, a modern trattoria across the town square from the historic butcher shop that playfully connects past and present courtesy of TIMOTHEE Studio’s unconventional interior design. Architectural designers Cosimo Bonciani, Andrea Mascagni and Niccoló Antonielli upended expectations by imbuing the historic premises with a theatrical, nightclub-like ambience inspired by the Italian discotheques of the 1970s. Underpinned by a vibrant palette of reds – a colour symbolic of passion and love as much as flesh – and animated by reflective surfaces and geometric forms, the restaurant straddles the 18th and 20th centuries with nostalgic elegance welcoming patrons into what the proprietors describe as meat lovers’ place of worship.
Stepping off the historic town square into the restaurant, a mirror-clad butcher’s counter signals that this is no ordinary trattoria. A striking geometrical volume, the reflective counter disappears into its surroundings allowing the fleshy cuts of meat on display to take centre stage. Further down the space, the main dining area draws you in thanks to the theatrical, merlot-red curtain that stretches across the back wall. Modern banquettes and chairs in vibrant pink and red hues that pick up the meat’s fleshy coloration introduce playful 1970s vibes, as does a graphic light grid on the ceiling that echoes the checkered floor pattern. Antique black and white checkered marble flooring and patinated hand-painted walls that evoke the building’s centuries-old history are juxtaposed with red-painted wall and floor sections that whimsically bisect the space.
Red also marks the arched portal leading to the underground dining area via a red-painted staircase. Once a cellar and storage space, the brick-vaulted space has been transformed into a paradigm of contemporary sophistication with the use of reflective stainless steel wall panels, red flooring and concealed lighting. Superstudio’s Quaderna tables, which were originally designed in the 1970s for Zanotta, animate the space with their square grid pattern and visually connect it with the ground floor by echoing the floor and ceiling square patterns. Finally, a cozy lounge area at the far end adds pops of colour with a sofa and armchairs in red upholstery and a blue, red and yellow graphic mural.