Kallos Turin designs new wine cellar and tasting room for Casa Cavia, Buenos Aires

21 May, 2024 - Kallos Turin is pleased to announce the completion of a newly designed wine cellar and private tasting room for Buenos Aires cultural destination, Casa Cavia.

Casa Cavia is a historic house facing Alemania Square in the city's Palermo Chico district. The original building, designed in 1929 by the distinguished architect Alejandro Christophersen, remains a poetic reminder of the elegant residences that once populated this historic square. In 2014, Kallos Turin was commissioned to renovate the historic building to include a café, perfumery, flower shop, courtyard garden and publishing offices. Over the past decade, under the leadership of the property's Creative Director, Lupe Garcia, Casa Cavia has evolved to become a primary cultural destination in the city, and Kallos Turin has updated and renovated the spaces to evolve alongside her vision. ​ 

Marking Casa Cavia's 10th anniversary this year, Lupe Garcia saw an opportunity to highlight the family’s long history with wine collecting and now with wine making. Kallos Turin has developed the first floor to include a wine cellar and private tasting room, called El Privado. The new spaces continue Kallos Turin's ongoing design concept for Casa Cavia - to restore the 1920s house by retaining original details and carefully inserting modern design elements. This time, the focus was on creating spaces for joyful gatherings that center on wine and viticulture. ​

The cellar is designed in a dark burgundy to create a more intimate and private setting. ​ A central table seats 10 people and was custom made from salmon colored resin with chairs by local designer, Ries Estudio. The cellar is wrapped in wine and has more than eighty national and imported labels. At the local level, the wine collection is concentrated on outstanding vintages – from award winning wines, to special editions. By contrast, El Privado is a larger, lighter, space filled with shelving and books and designed to encourage longer meals and discussions. The table is also made from resin, but this time in a burgundy to relate back to the burgundy walls in the adjacent cellar. 

Kallos Turin is delighted to contribute to the evolution of the historic landmark. Speaking on the renovation to Christophersen’s original building, Kallos Turin co-founder Stephania Kallos describes the firm's experience working with the building's intelligent and elegant original proportions, plan and detailing:

“When you work on a building of this caliber, you learn from its original architect and you hope to take some of what you learned into your next projects,” says Stephania Kallos. “We were also inspired by the idea of this small, graceful building having held its place on a block that has otherwise been completely developed – ​ in its small elegant way, it is a very powerful force on the street. We think this is a lovely metaphor for the strength of the programming the house now contains”.

NOTES TO EDITORS

About Casa Cavia

Lupe García’s creative vision for Casa Cavia is based on finding new talents and making them hosts of the house. In this way the house still holds a family, as it originally did, but one made of a unique group of talented purveyors. La Cocina is run by Julieta Caruso, who spent nine years at the acclaimed Spanish restaurant Mugaritz. She leads the kitchen team and creates Casa Cavia menus. She is known for her multidisciplinary approach to food, which draws an array of artistic disciplines from cinema, to music, to literature and theatre. Flavia Arroyo heads the bar program with the same multidisciplinary style. ​ Delvis Huk heads the wine program and winemaker, Andrés Vignoni is responsible for the incorporation of international labels. Camila Gassiebayle brings her unique and inventive approach to florals through the Blumm Flower Co.

About Kallos Turin

Established in 2003 by Stephania Kallos and Abigail Turin, Kallos Turin is an international architecture and interior design firm based in London and San Francisco. Having first met when working for David Chipperfield Architects, Stephania and Abigail have collaborated across the Atlantic for over two decades, working on residential, commercial, office, restaurant, and retail projects around the world. Stephania leads the firm’s London office and Abby spearheads the practice in San Francisco. The firm’s work, while steeped in the tenants of modernism, challenges the restraint and the rigor of a purely reductive approach to form by introducing layers of elegance, eclecticism and invention – all guided by the client’s personal interests and specific needs.

The London and San Francisco offices collaborate on the design phase for each project, ensuring the most thoughtful and creative concept designs are generated during this exciting phase with the client. A senior partner will then manage the project through to completion, delivering a highly bespoke service that brings the client’s vision to life with every detail. The firm’s work is now recognized globally, and Kallos Turin is honored to have been awarded the prestigious International Award from the Royal Institute of British Architects for its design of the Villalagos Residences in Uruguay.