Description

The Prada fashion house has grown rapidly since the eighties and originates from a time-honoured, family-owned leather manufacturer in Milan. The owners, Miuccia Prada and her partner Patrizio Bertelli, acquired the Società Italiana Spiriti, a former gin distillery from the early 20th-century, in the south of Milan as a location for their Fondazione and its important collection of modern and contemporary art. It is the second location of the Fondazione alongside a palazzo in Venice. Rem Koolhaas, who worked with Miuccia Prada for many years (designing, among other things, the brand’s showroom), was commissioned to carry out the conversion and to produce three additions. Tucked away on a site barely reachable via public transport in the depths of Largo Isarco bordering twenty railway lines of a freight station, a hidden, self-contained world has been created. The distillery buildings are low and inconspicuous, with only a raised block protruding somewhat, which OMA coated with gold leaf. In 2018, the final element on the north-west corner of the site was opened: the “Torre”, which right from the start Koolhaas had planned as the third and final addition.

This crowning gesture changes everything: the foundation for art and culture now announces its presence with a new, conspicuous landmark that doesn’t fail to catch the attention of passers-by. The extremely elegant tower is both a clear statement – and simultaneously raises questions with its unconventional, sculptural form. The white concrete tower is composed of individual floors with a total area of 2000 m², each of which has a different height: the first floor is only 2.70 m high, while the ninth floor is 8 m high. Six of the floors serve as exhibition halls. They house a permanent collection with works by Jeff Koons (Tulips), Walter De Maria, Mona Hatoum, Edward & Nancy Reddin Kienholz and, on the two uppermost floors, by William N. Copley, Damien Hirst, John Baldessari and Carsten Höller, among others.

What seems like a simple-looking block from afar becomes increasingly enigmatic as one comes closer. Placed up against the corner of the site, it pushes into the road and is simultaneously cut away at an angle at ground level. The outline of the floor plan varies on each floor, sometimes rectangular, sometimes roughly trapezoidal. The shifting form is particularly apparent on the northern long side of the façade.

The different floor heights have implications for the stairs, which needed careful elaboration so that the flights accommodate the different number of steps required. It is a central space within the tower: open, wide and generous. Vast glass surfaces, certainly a considerable cost factor like all other large-format glass surfaces of the Torre, separate the staircases from each other. On each floor, the visitor enters only one exhibition hall, which opens either to the north or to the short side to the east. The room-high frames of the glass fronts to the loggias were designed for maximum clarity and can slide invisible to one side, the mechanism carefully concealed from view. At the same time, Koolhaas contrasts the high-tech with the very simple, using plywood panels in the exhibition halls or drywall partitions behind bars in the stairwell.

The 6th floor is reserved for the Torre restaurant run by a star chef. It is a world of its own complete with interiors transferred partially wholesale from Philip Johnson’s famous “Four Seasons” restaurant in New York from 1958. One partakes of one’s meal in the company of works by William N. Copley, Lucio Fontana and John Wesley. The roof was converted into a 160 m² terrace with a bar. Most of the rooms face north overlooking the mostly inactive railway tracks, with a view of the Milan skyline beyond, which has changed significantly in recent years with new glass towers, none of which compare to the Torre Velasca and Torre Pirelli. The Fondazione’s exhibition tower can also be reached separately from a road alongside the tracks via a sliding opening, a means of access made necessary by the restaurant. Along with the roof terrace, it is also available for hire for events.

Originally published in Bauwelt 15.2018, pp. 20-25, abridged and edited for Building Types online, translated by Julian Reisenberger

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