Villa Girasole, the swivel Villa

Villa Girasole, the swivel Villa

 

Few kilometers far from Hotel Bareta, in Marcellise, there is a unique villa. One of the many jewels of Italy. You find hard to believe, it dates back to the 30s. It is an Art Nouveau building built by the engineer Angelo Invernizzi between 1929 and 1935. The project is undoubtedly futuristic. Its inventor, devoted to the cult of sun, translated the ambitious ideas of the futurist movement of that historical period in a futuristic building.

 

The villa was able to rotate on itself making a rotation of 360 °, following the movement of the sun. The mechanism allowed the house to rotate 4 millimeters per second, making a full circle on itself in 9 hours and 20 minutes. The mechanism was driven by a motor located at the bottom of the structure, the same like a cruise ship. The slow rotation was moved and allowed by a central pin that moved the building on rails.

 

Through this mechanism, the house was always exposed to the sun (here comes the name Villa “Sunflower”): a project as ambitious as the precursor of modern energy saving technologies!

 

Some interesting videos:

How it turns! watch the video!

(3D Simulation)

 

 

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