St. Paulo Foligno, Italian Church Building, Perugia Architecture
Chiesa di San Paolo Apostolo
Religious Building in Perugia, central Italy church design by Massimiliano FUKSAS architects
Design: Studio FUKSAS Architects
Location: Perugia, Umbria, central Italy
Massimiliano FUKSAS
St. Paul’s Church in Foligno, Perugia, Italy
Date built: 2009
St. Paul Apostle’s Church (Chiesa di San Paolo Apostolo)
“Suspending a volume inside another. Seeing the sky through the concrete from the outside, into the inside, toward the outside”. Massimiliano Fuksas
7 Feb 2014
St. Paulo Church, Foligno
This project won the national competition organised by the Italian Episcopal Conference to design new parish centres: “to provide an innovative and decisive landmark in accordance with the latest international research and symbolising the rebirth of the city after the earthquake”.
The new parish complex is composed of two main elements, which also serve the purpose of providing a religious centre. The first feature, the church, is a monolith designed in a pure geometric form, a box within a box measuring 30×22.5 metres by 25 m in height. The second feature, an elongated low parallelepiped, holds the Vestry, Pastoral Ministry rooms and Canonical House. A third translucent structure, the Weekday Chapel, both joins together and distinguishes the two main structures.
A thrust towards spirituality and quiet prayer blend together in an interplay of beams of natural light crossing the structure both transversely and vertically, projecting towards the main features, the Altar, Ambo and Baptismal Font. The striking structure is raised one a half metres above grade level.
It can be reached by crossing a parvis, a long walkway leading to the entrance, a clean horizontal cut into the absolute compactness marking the entire front elevation.
A beam of light which interacts with the outside. All the furniture have been designed by local craftsmen. They even help alter how we perceive the works of certain artists.
The artist Enzo Cucchi designed the monumental “Pole-Cross” sculpture outside the church, which is 13.50 m tall and made of concrete and white Carrara marble, actually turning into an architectural feature itself.
Chiesa di San Paolo Apostolo – Building Information
OBJECT: San Paolo Parish Complex
SITE: Foligno (Perugia, Italy
DATE: 2001-09
CLIENT: Italian Episcopal Conference – Diocesi of Foligno
PROJECT: Massimiliano and Doriana Fuksas
INTERIOR DESIGN: Fuksas Design for iGuzzini
STRUCTURES AND ENGINEERING: AI ENGINEERING s.r.l.,Torino; Engineer Gilberto Sarti, Rimini
ARTISTIC INTERVENTION: Enzo Cucchi and Mimmo Paladino
TOTAL AREA: 20.690 Mq
PARISH COMPLEX AREA: 1.300 Mq
TYPE: realized project
Photos: Moreno Maggi
Chiesa di San Paolo Apostolo Building Film on YouTube
Chiesa di San Paolo Apostolo Building information / images received from Massimiliano FUKSAS Architects
Perugia north of Rome, and 148 km (92 miles) south-east of Florence. It covers a high hilltop and part of the valleys around the area. The region of Umbria is bordered by Tuscany, Lazio and Marche.
Location: Foligno, Perugia, Italy, southern Europe
Italian Architecture Designs
Contemporary Italian Architectural Selection
Italian Architectural Designs – chronological list
Studio Fuksas, led by Massimiliano and Doriana Fuksas, is an international architectural practice with offices in Rome, Paris, Shenzhen.
Of Lithuanian descent, Massimiliano Fuksas was born in Rome in 1944. He graduated in Architecture from the University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 1969. Since the eighties he has been one of the main protagonists of the contemporary architectural scene.
He has been Visiting Professor at a number of universities such as: Columbia University in New York, the École Spéciale d’Architecture in Paris, the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Wien, the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Stuttgart. From 1998 to 2000 he directed the “VII Mostra Internazionale di Architettura di Venezia”: “Less Aesthetics, More Ethics”. Since 2000 he has been the author of the architecture column – founded by Bruno Zevi – in the Italian news magazine “L’Espresso”.
He is the recipient of several prizes and awards, including the “Medaglia della Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri” in 2012; the “Légion d’Honneur” given by the President of the French Republic in 2010, and the “Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française” in 2000. He won the “Grand Prix National d’Architecture Française“, in 1999 and the career prize “Vitruvio International a la Trayectoria”, in 1998, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
He is a member of RIBA – Royal Institute of British Architects, London, UK -, AIA – American Institute of Architects, Washington D.C., USA -, the Académie d’Architecture, Paris, France, and the Accademia di San Luca, Italy.
Doriana Fuksas was born in Rome where she graduated in History of Modern and Contemporary Architecture at the University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 1979. She has also earned a degree in Architecture from ESA, École Spéciale d’Architecture, Paris. She has worked with Massimiliano Fuksas since 1985 and has been director in charge of “Fuksas Design” since 1997.
She has received a number of prizes and international awards. In 2013 she has been appointed “Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française” and in 2002 “Officier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de la République Française”.
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