Architecture

There is a recognisable Lake Como building, and it is not a style so much as a set of answers to a difficult site: a steep slope, a body of water at the bottom, arrivals historically from the water, and a climate that is humid in summer and wet in winter. The loggia, the raised principal floor, the shuttered windows, the terrace cut into the hill: each of them is doing a job.

The writing here reads the buildings as consequences rather than decoration, and takes seriously the question of what happens when a house like that meets a twenty-first-century family who want a kitchen, five bathrooms and underfloor heating. Some of that is possible. Some of it costs more than it is worth, and the cost is not financial.

Consents, protection and the permitting process are a separate subject with its own guide, and are deliberately kept out of these pieces.