Roxanich Wine & Heritage Hotel

Roxanich Winery & Heritage Hotel is located in Motovun, an ancient medieval town located in the center of Istria – on the crossroads of old roads and Parenzana railway, the flow of infrastructure canals of the Mirna Valley, housing network, indigenous agriculture, livestock, trade and tourism. It is the product of a continuous urban flow and continuous activity within which old urban hierarchies disappear, old spatial relations are erased, the need for zoning of space according to predefined, precisely defined purposes is lost, while architectural typologies based on function lose their role and centuries-old purpose. We are in a space of complete adaptability and changeable programming. Roxanich Hotel and Wine Cellar in Motovun is a product of just such a state which consists of old stone house and cellar, new annex and underground garage, storage and wine cellar.

Being placed in a historic location, with a landscape of hills and vineyards but also confronted with various functional demands of hotel functions and vine making process, project makes complex composition of an old stone house, an old cellar, a new annex, an underground garage, a buried warehouse and a wine cellar. This complex building with its shape and tectonics reconstructs the natural hill, builds a path that starts in the vineyard, continues through the house, cellar and hotel, thus building an uninterrupted, continuous flow, passage, wine and tourism road. The radical plasticity of the building shapes the landscape, creates a new meandering building of the hotel restaurant with wellness and apartments, and restores the memory of the Istrian wine cellar with the existing old stone building. It is designed through 28 different rooms located inside the old building and four spacious suites in the new annex of the hotel.

Having different functional demands, we design a project that follows it with structure and materials. On the top there is an old stone house and new anex of red concrete which facilitate hotel functions. Below, embedded in the ground, vine cellar takes up three floors out of concrete. Communication with nature is obtained by green roof and serpentine roads on the top of vine cellar which makes direct communication with vineyards possible while being sustainable.