Villa Cantilena occupies a site on the top of a hill in a quiet residential neighbourhood within Victoria Gardens. The façade on the street is discreet, refined and solid, and gives nothing away of what lies behind. This outer protective shell of the Villa, composed of traditional Maltese limestone walls with minimal penetrations so as to preserve the privacy of the owners, is a pleasant foil to the busier elevations of the houses around.
On entering, a travertine pathway leads to heart of the Villa. Here, standing within the Villa’s main pool and garden area, the visitor almost surprisingly stumbles upon the building itself which opens up, revealing itself and the spaces it contains so that the volume of the house is finally perceived in its entirety. In contrast to the solid stone street façade, the inner façade is characterized by large openings overlooking the villa’s garden, pool and deck areas and beyond, a panoramic view of the Mediterranean Sea over the surrounding urban roofscape.
Villa Cantilena brings together form and function, through the design of spaces which efficiently serve the family’s needs, while modulating the way light is perceived in these spaces, through carefully positioned skylights and sculpted windows on the stone façades, through the course of the day. The facades facing South-East on the other hand, are sculpted in fair-faced concrete giving the impression of a large-scale curtain drawn open onto a view of the Villa’s garden and the sea beyond. Ensuring the functional use of the external pool and garden areas is integral to the Mediterranean lifestyle, with the garden lovingly created in collaboration with landscape designer, Melina Scodanibbio.
The material palette for the Villa is kept simple yet sophisticated; a subtle play of limestone walls, sculpted concrete, travertine flooring and wood combinations balance the vernacular and the contemporary soul of the Villa, creating contrast between void and solidity, opacity and transparency, the organic and the man-made.
