Thesis Provisional Title:
Guilty Pleasures. The Project of Seaside ‘Villa-Mania’ in Postwar Italy (1958-1973)


The thesis aims to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the proliferation of seaside holiday villas in Italy between 1958 the 1973, an implicit project which the author defines as ‘Villa-Mania’.
 The thesis examines the villa typology through three lenses exploring ecology, professionalism, and class. These themes are explored through a dialectic comparison of six building stories. The thesis employs a methodological approach involving consultation with primary sources, on-site visits supported by photography, and interviews with inhabitants and relatives of the architects. The objective is to re-examine villa architecture, arguing that despite existing outside urban centers of knowledge and critical inquiry, it remains a rich but unexplored source of architectural intelligence, history, and ideology within contemporary architecture and research culture


Photography © Michela Bonomo