The Landscape within the House. A reflection on the relationship between landscape and architecture

Inhabitation is the primary action of becoming root- ed with the land through settlement. The dwelling space is an expression of this bond – both inside and out. To feel oneself inextricably linked to a place, to exist in it perceiving it as an integral part of one’s existential reality, is to place the landscape as the fundamental core of the living space. In the ancient forms of living, this core of domes- tic life was the hearth – archetypal representation of a purely introspective idea of architecture. Conversely, the landscape today represents a characteristic element of modern and contemporary inversions of the housing and typological modalities. The house meant shelter – a protective enclosure whose centralities were the fire and the patio; in the contemporary experience, we look away from the center and gaze towards outside. Reality is no longer impervious. Once changed into art, into a sce- nario, reality becomes domestic; it becomes landscape, the lifeblood of man’s abode. Therefore, living a space is a conceptual and material expression of this current condition of externalization when it comes to belonging to places whilst linked to perception. But the physical and psychological root- ing with the site is also the central principle of a deeper meaning and – above all, a timeless meaning of liv- ing.