Conscious Evasion of Consistency

architects Studio 3LHD
project Adriatic Hotel, Rovinj, Croatia
written by Mira Stanić

 

Urban tissue of the historical nucleus of Rovinj (declared cultural heritage in 1963) has condensed centuries of building within. Irregular cubes of the blocks that resulted from cohabitation of the middle age layers and interpolations of subsequent epochs create a coherent whole with an almost inherent feeling for measure and relationships between individual elements within the composition. In mid−17th century, the town started to spread over the canal that separated it from the mainland and in 1763, this narrow sea passage was covered with earth. What is today Marshal Tito Square with funnel-shaped configuration formed at that time, opening up towards the St. Catherine Port, is actually the sea that was covered with earth. Exactly in this spot, along the very edge of former walls, where turning one’s gaze from the space within the walls towards open sea almost symbolically announced mythical proportions of the importance that tourism would have until present time for social, economic, and cultural development of this town, Maria and Louis Löffler from Vienna started to build the first Rovinj hotel, Adriatic, in 1912. It opened its doors as soon as the following year.