Designed by Enota, Hotel Maestoso serves as the primary point of contact between visitors and the stud farm environment in Lipica, Slovenia.

Designed by Enota, Hotel Maestoso

Fact File
Location: Lipica, Slovenia
Client: Holding Kobilarna Lipica
Building area: 7.785 m2
Site area: 9.970 m2
Status: Built 2021
Cost: 11.500.000 EUR
Photography: Miran Kambič
Source: V2Com

The Stud Farm Lipica is one of the most remarkable natural and cultural monuments in Slovenia. The landscape comprises laid-out pastures and meadow areas featuring protective fences, oak groves, and tree lanes. In the 1970s, large tourist accommodation buildings were constructed in response to the exceptionalism of Stud Farm Lipica brining visitors from across the world.

Hotel Maestoso’s relatively aggressive appearance - due to the use of architectural elements of a specific period - poses a strong, even distracting contrast with the smoothness of the access paths used to access the complex as a whole. A distinctive line of white fences, undulating among the green tree lanes and natural landscape abruptly terminates at the parking area and overbearing presence of an existing hotel building.

A primary focus in the renovation and expansion of the hotel was to tone down the building’s presence in the space, which led to a plan to de-materialize the built masses. The proposed intervention was to purge the hotel’s facade of all added architectural elements, and to unify the structure’s expression by establishing a new, light load-bearing structure of balconies.

Designed by Enota, Hotel Maestoso

The new structural membrane that envelops the entire hotel and swimming pool area establishes a sort of buffer between the buildings and the landscape. The interplay of light and shadows breaks down the monolithic built masses and, together with the envisaged greening of the existing volume with climbing plants, de-materializes the building to the greatest extent possible, while endowing it with a distinctive character.

The interiors are designed as a modern interpretation of the interior spaces of the horse stables. Accordingly, the public program is designed as a particularly flexible space, with folding partition walls making it adaptable to any given need. The existing building was stripped to its raw concrete structure, which remains visible and acts as a suitable frame for the minimal additional interventions.

Designed by Enota, Hotel Maestoso

The use of materials found in stables, carefully designed lighting, and small, movable furnishings combine to form a warm space.