At 3,026m above sea level in Italy’s Aurina valley, stifter + bachmann has realized an unusually-shaped mountain hut called ‘Sasso Nero’. The name of this six-story refuge translates to “black stone”, and similarly to how a rock is eroded by the wind, the building’s form has been shaped to withstand hurricane-level gusts. As well as withstanding the severe winds, the refuge is also designed with as small a footprint as possible. For this reason, stifter + bachmann stacked the program in six levels that bend slightly at the top and the bottom. The first floor is home to a restaurant and dining space with a ribbon window that affords a 360° panoramic view of the incredible mountain scenery.
The two lower levels contain services while the top three storys provide sleeping accommodation for up to 50 hikers. Guest rooms are designed for two or ten persons and they also offer scenic alpine views with small, irregularly positioned picture-frame windows. With these stacked floors, the architectural footprint in the landscape is kept to a minimum, as the hut touches the ground below only along narrow strip foundations that are anchored in the rock. Apart from the staircase, all of the interiors and all of the furniture is made from or clad in natural spruce. The use of one continuous material makes sasso nero feel like a large piece of inhabitable furniture.

The exterior of the building is encased in copper, for two ...