POGGI UGO TERRACOTTA FOR FIORENTINA’S NEW HOME: THE VIOLA PARK

What we are about to tell you is a story about teamwork.

A teamwork that starts from the world of football and specifically from the football team of the city of Florence: Fiorentina.

Fiorentina, with the new presidency led by Rocco Commisso, has been given a new home: the Viola Park, the largest sports centre in Italy, one of the most avant-garde in Europe.

This new centre is not only important for the world of football, but it is important for the whole of Italy in terms of landscape and architecture, once again shining the spotlight on our country – through sport – for a work that is a new feather in the cap to be counted among Italian excellences.

Another team has realised this ambitious project: the Studio Archea Associati, headed by Architect Marco Casamonti, one of the most important names in the world of national and international architecture. The Viola sports centre is located a stone’s throw from the centre of Florence, Bagno a Ripoli, in a verdant area surrounded by the typical Tuscan hills with a strategic position with respect to the city’s logistics and public transport.

The project is really big: 26 hectares in total: 2 stadiums, 12 regular pitches that will host all the teams, from the training sessions of the Serie A to the 8-year-old children of the Viola nursery, including the women’s team, as well as the club’s headqaurters. An inclusive environment, in which one breathes international air, like an American Campus.

One of the fundamental concepts behind the Viola Park was certainly sustainability: based on the principles of bio-architecture, the project integrated the recovery of a pre-existing farmhouse – Villa Favard, with the connotation of a typical Tuscan country house – into an avant-garde context, both in terms of design and technology: pavilions with V-shaped roofs (recalling the initial letter of Viola) equipped with compluvial waterproofing for collecting and draining rainwater, composite pylons made of recyclable wood, aluminium and steel, exploitation of natural lighting thanks to large windows, sail-shaped roofs equipped with photovoltaic panels to meet energy needs.

In short, it is a hyper-modern and technologically advanced project that has been realised for the new Viola home.

It is at this point that another team enters the field: that of Poggi Ugo Terrecotte; in the context of the Viola Park as it has been conceived, that is as a combination of Tuscan tradition and international avant-garde, of hyper-technology and sustainability, the large terracotta furnishings from our outdoor accessories collection have found their natural place.

Having chosen to furnish the outdoor areas of the Viola Park with large terracotta pitchers further strengthens the link and integration with the Tuscan landscape.

The model that was selected for the new Viola house is the large Millerighe Egg, an artefact of considerable size, 108 cm high and with a diameter of 85 cm, repeated to decorate the large outdoor areas of the innovative sports centre.

he design of this object makes it both traditional and contemporary. This artefact was created starting from the idea of the jar, which has become a symbol of Tuscan history and tradition; in this case, however, the shape is precisely that of the perfect egg (from which it takes its name), the radius is much more uniform, and the classic handles have been removed, in favour of a very modern aesthetic, enhanced by the thin-striped decoration. In doing so, the utilitarian concept with which the jar was originally conceived has been subverted, making it into a design element that needs nothing else, because it is beautiful just as it is.

Also from the point of view of sustainability – a fundamental concept of the entire project – the inclusion of terracotta objects was consistent: terracotta is an entirely natural material, composed, as we know, only of earth and water. A terracotta item also has a long durability and is infinitely recyclable.

There is no doubt that for a project of excellence such as the Viola Park, Poggi Ugo terrecotte items were chosen!