The Rooms of Rome, a unique experience that offers personalized stays in which art and architecture have no boundaries, has just arrived in the most historical part of the city. The 24 apartments are located in “rhinoceros” a historic palace conceived by the Fondazione Alda Fendi – Esperimenti and have been designed and furnished by the great architect Jean Nouvel.
The Rooms of Rome apartment, designed by Jean Nouvel; image source: theroomsofrome
These special and unique fully equipped apartments offer state of the art of technology and domotics while respecting the building’s history and background.
The apartments have also been conceived to create a personalized stay, offering an infinite range of possibilities when visiting the Eternal City. Therefore, anyone experiencing The Rooms of Rome can create a truly exclusive feeling based on each person’s needs, dreams and wishes. While the apartments will provide L’Occitane amenities, a pillow menu, as well as the highest quality linens and furnishings, guests will be able to choose, prior to their check-in, from a wide variety of perfumes for their room, as well as to become aware of additional experiences, provided “á la carte”by partners, which include absolutely everything a person might need, from beauty treatments and massages, to anytype of lessons or training, to show cooking, entertainment, museum and city private tours and even art creation.
The Rooms of Rome apartment, designed by Jean Nouvel; image source: theroomsofrome
Jean Nouvel and The Rooms of Rome architecture
Here, where Roman history was born, Jean Nouvel imagined the apartments as a completely innovative place: designing them not as living spaces in the traditional sense but constituting “openable” areas, steel boxes that reproduce environments and services such as kitchens, bathrooms or cabinets, designed and patented only for the rhinoceros building, whose refined modernity stands in stark contrast to the walls.
“The architect is Jean Nouvel – a man who has made an award-studded career out of structures conceived to contextualise and converse with what surrounds them – and the project is the new seat of the Fondazione Alda Fendi – Esperimenti, the non-profit arts foundation created by Alda, the youngest of the five sisters who together revolutionised the powerhouse Roman fashion brand that bears their family name. Since its inception in 2001, the foundation has put on free exhibitions and performances, enlisting international talents from the worlds of music, dance, film, theatre, opera and the visual arts,” wrote howtospendit.ft.com in its review.
From each window of the apartments, which develop on four floors, one enjoys a unique and different view of the monuments of the Forum Boarium: The Arch of Janus, the splendid church of San Giorgio al Velabro, the temple of Hercules Victor, known as the Temple of Vesta, and the Palatine Hill.
The Rooms of Rome apartment, designed by Jean Nouvel; image source: theroomsofrome
The Rooms of Rome apartment, designed by Jean Nouvel; image source: theroomsofrome
rhinoceros and the Fondazione Alda Fendi – Esperimenti
rhinoceros, created by the Fondazione Alda Fendi – Esperimenti, represents the synthesis of the Foundation’s philosophy that since 2001 has promoted artistic experimentations that go beyond the conventional boundaries between the disciplines: exhibitions, multimedia creations, action, artistic interferences involving different experiential areas, visual and performing arts.
“rhinoceros is the experiment conceived by the Fondazione Alda Fendi – Esperimenti: a real “city of art”: a place to visit through the passageways of the art gallery, to live in its magnificent 24 apartments immersed in the heart of ancient Rome, there were Rome was born, and to be admired for the atmosphere of its dreamy terraces. A hub of attraction, a lighthouse illuminated day and night, where artistic research and creativity find their ideal home”.
The very name palazzo rhinoceros is an indication towards the world of imperial Rome – caput mundi -, where the rhinoceros’, strong and powerful, steered the crowds to the benevolence of the emperor.
“It is difficult to build in Rome. An architect is logically obliged to respect the hierarchy of historic architecture, so we are bound by a great sobriety,” explained Jean Nouvel.
“On the facades we have preserved everything that could testify to the passage of time… emphasizing the different layers to reveal a building that has stopped ageing without the aid of plastic surgery (all its wrinkles are loved and preserved)… This approach anchors these buildings more firmly in history,” explained the architect.
The Rooms of Rome apartment, designed by Jean Nouvel; image source: theroomsofrome
Caviar Kaspia Roma
Also located at the fifth and sixth floors of the palazzo rhinoceros and connected to the exhibition gallery spaces of the Fondazione Alda Fendi – Esperimenti is Caviar Kaspia Roma, a Russian inspired gastronomic proposal with over 90 years of history. The brand arrives in Rome as the gallery restaurant, offering selected products such as Norwegian salmon, imperial crab and the inevitable caviar.
“Reassessing the building also means playing with all the interior differences and features to create 25 unique apartments. Each apartment has different views framed by windows changed over time, often narrowed and sometimes even walled up. The most significant changes were mostly in the interior.”
image source: theroomsofrome
