Sustainable hotel to promote urban redevelopment.

The “Slow Horse” hotel in Piancavallo, Friuli was designed by Italian architecture firm, Elasticospa whose goal was to give a new face to a 1970s building, seeking to engage with the surrounding nature.



The township of Piancavallo, in the province of Pordenone was originally developed as a small ski-resort in the 1970s and has no real architectural identity. The italian architecture firm, Elasticospa named its project “Slow Horse”, the English translation of Piancavallo and approached the renovations of the original building almost playfully.





They partly demolished the original hotel, retaining only the ground floor as the foundation which the architects worked on to create a building that engages with its context, fitting into the mountain landscape as harmoniously as possible.



Three timber floors have been added to a reinforced concrete platform jutting out of the foundation and supported by tripods, as a conceptual reference to local tradition. This prefabricated structure kept down building times and environmental impact.





The rooms are oriented to make the most of the sun and the view of the natural panorama. The roof has been designed to keep and release water, snow and ice. The local untreated wood façade will change colour gradually until it turns a similar shade of grey as the rocks and stones.





The expressive strength of the Slow Horse project is communication with the environment.

Client: Promotur S.p.A.
Area: 3450 m2
Project: ELASTICOSPA + 3, http://www.elasticospa.com
Team: Stefano Pujatti, Alberto Del Maschio, Stefano Trucco, Cesare Roluti, Valeria Brero, Corrado Curti, Daniele Almondo, Serena Nano, Marco Burigana, Andrea Rosada
Structural design: Stefano Santarossa
Builder: Riccesi S.p.A.
Year: 2010
Photos: Donato Riccesi, Jacopo Riccesi