Cascina Morelli 1862 – Avigliana (TO)
On the slopes of Mount Pirchiriano, overlooking the lakes of Avigliana (TO), Cascina Morelli 1862 is ready to become a design B&B after five years of architectural restoration carried out by the firm of building surveyor Giorgio Gillio. Here, time seems to be suspended between rural memory and contemporary comfort.
The Maritano family transformed their farmhouse into a refuge where each room pays homage to an ancient craft – barn, spinning wheel, granary, cellar – restoring dignity and poetry to gestures and knowledge now lost.
In this dialogue between past and present, architect Paolo Francia created an interior design project that challenges conventions: in the attic rooms with exposed beams, antique furniture and rural tools coexist with Instabilelab wallpaper, which is called upon not to decorate but to narrate. Odette, Lilibet, Madara, and Armonia graphics become the absolute protagonists of the rooms, emphasising the contrast with the antique furniture and transforming each room into the visual chapter of a larger story.
The result is a unique balance: the authentic rurality of the Piedmontese farmhouse interacts with contemporary botanical patterns, giving life to rooted and surprising atmospheres. This project demonstrates how wallpaper can be the narrative voice of a space, rather than just a wall covering.
We met with architect Francia to explore the design choices and technical challenges of this project, discovering how each graphic was selected to evoke a craft, an atmosphere, a fragment of collective memory.
-At Cascina Morelli, each room is named after an ancient craft: Barn, Spinning Wheel, Granary, Cellar. How did you choose among Instabilelab graphics in order to translate the identity of each environment into a visual language? Was there a direct correspondence between the evoked craft and the graphic chosen, or did you work on more subtle and poetic combinations?
Yes, the choice made was certainly based on the combination between the graphics and the name of the ancient craft, but more than anything it was marked by the emotional feeling that the wallpaper suggested to us.
– One of the main features of this project is the contrast between contemporary wallpaper and antique furniture – old sewing machines, antique wardrobes, rough wood tools. How did you create this interaction between surfaces and objects from such different eras? What role did the scale and colour intensity of the graphics play in balancing this relationship?
To create this interaction, you have to create visual emotions. In fact, the finishes of the furnishing materials were chosen based on the scale and colour intensity of the graphic present in each wallpaper, playing with the juxtaposition of modernity and tradition.
– The bedrooms are all located in the attic. Sloped ceilings and exposed beams represent both an architectural constraint and an expressive opportunity. How did the technical features of Instabilelab substrates facilitate the application in such irregular contexts? Were there any specific adjustments in the layout or size of the graphics? In the master suite, wallpaper guides the guest all the way into the bathroom, covering also the bath area: which technique did you use for this particular application?
In this project, wallpaper becomes part of the architectural shape of the rooms, thus determining the volume of the rooms themselves. Thanks to the graphic possibility of arranging and adjusting Instabilelab wallpapers, it has been possible to perfectly integrate them into the apartment.
– In the Cellar Suite, lighting directly interacts with wallpaper, amplifying its depth and dynamism. How important was it to design your project based on the relationship between light, graphics, and materials in order to achieve an immersive atmosphere, yet coherent with the rural identity of the farmhouse?
In this project, the design of indirect and direct artificial light plays a key role in creating the right cosy, immersive, and contextualised atmosphere.
– In a hospitality project such as Cascina Morelli, wallpaper must not only meet aesthetic requirements, but also durability, maintenance and resistance over time. Which technical characteristics of Instabilelab materials convinced you to choose them for a hospitality context?
My choice of Instabilelab materials was based on the fact that the company offers different options for substrates, textures, and specific finishes to satisfy every need. These materials perfectly meet aesthetic and functional requirements in any context.
– Cascina Morelli tells a story about family, roots, and rebirth. How did Instabilelab graphics help translating this emotional dimension into a spatial experience for the guests? Is there a room in which you feel that this interaction between memory and design is particularly successful?
The emotional dimension was the basis of our design choices, because the emotion experienced by the guests must remain imprinted in their mind. For this reason, there is no room in which it is easier to sense this interaction, as we wanted to create a distinct emotional experience for each space.
Cascina Morelli 1862 shows how wallpaper can go beyond its decorative role to become a narrative tool capable of converting family stories, ancient crafts and rural memories into a visual surface. Architect Francia directed a project where the contrast between modernity and tradition does not generate friction, but harmony, dialogue, and visual emotions.
This result was possible thanks to the flexibility of the solutions proposed by Instabilelab, which enabled wallpaper to inhabit every corner of the farmhouse – from the attic rooms to the walls of the bath area – without ever denaturalising the original rural context.
