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Who would imagine that in the heart of TriBeCa, neighborhood of upcoming artists and headquarters of typical broken down lofts of great appeal to foreigners arriving in New York, are enormous two-room apartments of Italian design, extremely sophisticated and rich in detail? Virtually small, welcoming and habitable showcases of Italian design.
And yet it is there, in such a loft-apartment, that Aldo Andreoli lives temporarily. Architect from Torino, he is making his way through the difficult world of interior design, and New York architecture. His residence is on the fourth floor of 56 Thomas Street, a block away from the Odeon bar-restaurant (New York brunch institution) in one of the classic Renaissance Revival Building of the 19th century’s end.
Having come across the entrance, which opens up into the living room through an impressive archway, you find yourself in an open space, with high ceilings, illuminated by diffused light. A warm and extremely inviting environment which exudes an unusual attention to details and art pieces, exclusively Italian: Massimo Iosa’s chairs and sofas, Gae Aulenti’s small table, Prospero Rasullo’s chairs and dining room table, kitchen stools by Maurizio Peragalli, TV stand by Ron Arad. On the walls, paintings by Irina Silva, Bettina Warner, Kostabu, and Severini.
In the center of the loft, a wall lamp emanates a diffused light creating an impressive sculptured effect in the open kitchen, separated from the rest of the space by an oval kitchen island. Through a wide corridor one can access the first bathroom covered with Bisazza mosaic blue tile, and a laundry room with washer and dryer. At the end of the corridor the master bedroom, with a southern view of Manhattan, opens up through another archway into a large bath with covered mirrors, reflecting light onto an enormous jacuzzi.
For 6 months he lived on a sailboat in the Caribbean and then accepted a job in Venezuela as manager for the restoration of the Italo-Venezuelana Bank headquarters.
Finally, in '86 he arrived in New York, "every architect's dream." In New York he collaborated with various architects on several projects, among which Chester Cliver for the famous Vanity Fair office of Tina Brown, but he is not immune to the difficulties which New York imposes on foreigners, even those not looking for work.
On the lower floor, in an equally structured space, the office of Sanba, Inc., the construction and restoration firm established by Andreoli last year, after he returned to New York following a series of peregrinations. Andreoli arrived in America in '83, after having designed and directed construction of Torino’s first video bar. "Torino was getting too small" he says "and every time I tried to do something creative, they’'d get in my way."
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But you "fall in love with New York", and after a 2 year interval spent in Hawaii as director of project execution for as mansion designed by Ettore Sottsass on the island of Maui, he returned. He found the real estate market at a low, the lira strong, and suggested to a group of Italian investors that it was the right moment to purchase real estate in the United States.
Andreoli’s idea was to introduce a condominium with a ?design edge?, a concept unknown to American builders, and to resell it as a luxury loft building, with an "Italian-style" quality of detail. Taking cues from great industrial spaces transformed into lofts for artists who, needing ample spaces, didn’t have to worry about exposed pipes, bad floors, noisy heating, and protruding air conditioners, Andreoli utilized the same space to create apartments with central air-conditioning, built-in laundry room, bathrooms with bidets, and an overall "touch of class". "Therefore you have the open loft spaces with an uptown luxury", claims Andreoli. The choice of neighborhood could only fall on TriBeCa, territory of Robert De Niro and Isabella Rossellini, of New York's cinematography, swarming with young artists of varied backgrounds, new restaurants and stores. In the TriBeCa purchase prices and legal limitations are less than those in the more populated SoHo area, and many people are considering it one of the new residential areas of New York. New York lends itself to this type of adventure.
"It's true that we had a series of problems to deal with", states Andreoli, "among which endless documents to obtain permits from the Building Department and Landmark Commission to add a penthouse on the roof. But this is a country, as opposed to Italy, where if you work and do things well you'll be rewarded".
Within an 18 month time span, among bureaucratic battles in town hall, Andreoli renovated from top to bottom an entire six floor building: he restored the façade in terra-cotta and cast iron, replaced the pipes, introduced a new electrical installation, reconditioned the heating and air conditioning system, and the mechanical elevator system and, finally, built a two-bedroom apartment on every floor.
The construction story is worthy of being told. "We counted", says Andreoli "17 different languages were being spoken in this building during the construction phase, by carpenters, masons, painters, ceramic installers, plumbers, and electricians. The disadvantage to this type of work in America is that the level of craftsmanship here is much lower than in Italy, partly due to the fact that the American worker changes career much more frequently than the Italian counterpart. Therefore the necessity arises of finding trusted outside sources to whom specific tasks can be delegated. A system which contributes to, among other things, a more competitive cost."
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"I found myself", continues Andreoli, "directing work in a sort of Tower of Babel whose common theme was architecture, with Pakistanis renovating the façade, Yugoslavians laying the parquet floors, Chinese redoing the walls and who seemed to be the only ones capable of putting up the mosaic tiles in the bathroom?And the Italian designer Victor Garbarina who alone designed and installed all the lights and revised the building's entire electrical system."
"The difficulty is that while in Italy an architect works on designs and visits the building site every day, or twice a week, here he must always be present to care about the simplest details, including the length of the nails that a worker will push through the walls. In the end, there is not enough time to dedicate to the design because most of your time is applied to the actual work".
Regardless of that, such an attentive and direct supervision can be advantageous. The restructuring is now at the end, and the lofts are ready to be lived in, including the spectacular loft on the sixth floor, with circular bath and double-headed shower, transformed into a duplex by the addition of a wall and glass structure. The master bedroom opens up north and south on two large terraces from which all of downtown Manhattan can be admired, from the Woolworth building to Battery Park, and the New Jersey coast.
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