Enoteca dai Tosi Design Contest
The Stones of Matera are a large sculptural group carved into the local limestone, called ‘tufo’. The same material that is used for the town’s roads, courtyards and rooms, both indoors and outdoors. The city is one unified work of architecture.
The Tosi wine bar will breathe new life in this spatial and cultural complex, contributing to a renewed city scene in Matera in 2019.
We designed a platform for this new scene, introducing a foreign element into the homogeneous space of the historic city: a metal deck that descends from street level down to the levels of excavated stone. The metal surface, cold and reflective, is an evocation of the river that once flowed in ancient times on Via Buozzi and fed the underground cisterns. The metal deck enhances the stone masses of the rock through its contrast as it is laid out over the existing floors, and is separated from the walls, leaving a respectful distance between them. The deck is where all bar fixtures, plants and equipments are housed, avoiding invasive interventions on existing walls and vaults.
The continuity of the deck is contrasted by environments with specific functions and different wine experiences.
The courtyard, shaded by grapevines, is the first reception space for informal consumption either standing or sitting. From the courtyard, patrons are welcomed in the atrium, which is enlivened by sounds and colours from the kitchen, which is entirely covered in terracotta. The room at the intermediate level is dominated by terraced steps, which turns it into a little theatre for free degustation or guided wine tastings. The oak bar counter pivots, allowing it to be used in a variety of ways: for free tastings served from the bar, for wine tastings or performances. The staircase that descends to the cell is a gallery of wines presented together with the work tools that produced them: an expression of material culture, which reconnects the wine with its agricultural roots. From the gallery you enter the boutique, dominated by tall glass prisms for the display and storage of the wines; all around there are tables for wait service tasting. Finally, the cisterns offer yet another experience, with organic forms completely covered in raw or epoxied cork.
