CA – SA Home & Studio Refits a Historic Apartment with Grace
CA – SA Home & Studio lands in San Vito dei Normanni, Italy, as a poised live–work apartment by CA-SA studio. The 2025 intervention respects a historic shell while reorganizing rooms to serve both daily life and professional work. Cement tile floors and star-vaulted ceilings hold the memory; lime-based finishes return a quiet, earthy register to the rooms and set the tone for a contemporary layer of furnishings.
Morning light slides across patterned cement tiles, then climbs the soft curve of a star vault. The rooms hold their years, yet read freshly against lime-washed walls.
This is a live–work apartment in the center of San Vito dei Normanni, restored and reorganized by CA-SA studio. The project keeps the building’s historic bones intact and draws a restrained interior palette from local earth tones. Materials do the talking — old and new in deliberate dialogue.
Restore And Reveal
Preserved cement tile floors anchor the rooms with color and pattern, their original tones cleaned rather than recast. Overhead, star-vaulted ceilings regain clarity, their geometry emphasized by light grazing the lime-based finishes. Wall planes show nuanced neutrals that come from uncovering prior layers, a subtle record of use and time. Nothing shouts here; texture carries the narrative.
Reorganize Daily Life
The plan maintains the original room sequence yet reassigns purpose to knit work and home. Circulation reads as a gentle loop, with natural light cueing the shift from studio desks to domestic corners. Open thresholds keep sightlines long without collapsing privacy. It feels clear, not carved.
Set A Contemporary Layer
Aluminum and glass elements bring a crisp counterpoint to the historic envelope, their minimalist profiles sitting lightly on the tile. Pieces of modern design punctuate calmer stretches, while personal objects add a lived register (books, tools, and mementos cue use rather than display). The conversation is intentional: new elements don’t mimic the old; they trace a present tense against it. One quiet move at a time.
Color From The Ground
Earthy hues rising from the patterned flooring temper the neutral walls, lending warmth to the studio’s worktables and the home’s softer seating. Lime-based finishes absorb and diffuse daylight, so colors read matte and steady through the day. The result is calm visual continuity across functions. Light binds the rooms.
Anchor With Fire
A geometric fireplace, rigorous in outline and tactile in finish, becomes a measured focal point. Its imperfect surface pulls the hand and relates to the revealed layers around it. The piece works as a hinge between eras, a contemporary gesture that acknowledges memory. Heat, texture, and form align.
By dusk, the vaults deepen and the tiles hold a gentle sheen. The apartment reads composed, its material calm supporting both quiet work and private life. Craft leads the eye, and the old building answers in kind.
Photography courtesy of CA-SA studio
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