The 19th century Squero, on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice, is now home to an auditorium for 200 people, managed by the Giorgio Cini Foundation.
The original building, in masonry, measures about 28.70 m by 17.70 m and is dated between 1830 and 1879; the reference model is that of the squeri of the Arsenale, therefore an open building, with arches on the main sides and large roof supported by wooden trusses.
The restoration works of 1952 had radically changed the nature of the squero, transforming it into a closed building, inside which a reinforced concrete mezzanine and a thermal power station had been built.
The project recovers the spatiality of the original squero, emptying the interior and freeing the fronts.
The new volume is all made dry, in steel, wood and glass, suspended on wooden reticular beams, detached from all sides from the existing building.
Through a glass window about 13 meters wide, the panorama of the lagoon breaks into the room, with an effect of continuity between external and internal space, for a very special listening experience.
