It was inevitable that when Mario Cucinella designed a church—his first in 35 years as an architect, 30 of those years at the helm of his own firm—it would showcase curves. As a young man, he says, he was fascinated by the Baroque churches of Francesco Borromini, among them San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane and Sant’Ivo alla Sapienza, both in Rome and both known for sinuous surfaces. So after winning a competition to create the new parish church of Santa Maria Goretti in Mormanno, Calabria, in the south of Italy, he says, “I turned to my oldest friends” for inspiration.
With a budget of just about $1.75 million for the church and an accompanying, single-story parish center (containing classrooms and priests’ quarters), the architect could hardly go Baroque. Instead, he chose an irregular four-leaf clover shape that makes the church an alluring presence on its hillside site, at once reminiscent of Borromini’s masterpieces and the town’s humble stone buildings.
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