A delightful "Liberty" building in Piazza Wagner

A beautiful balcony on a delightful building of what we'd now call "condos," but which...More......

...Italians simply call "house."

The building, itself, is a simple rectangular cube on which has been applied sculpture, painted tiles and architectural decoration in the new "Liberty" (Italian Art Nouveau) style, like that characterizing the balconies, the sculpted frieze and the view of fruit trees on painted tiles that breathe the occidentalized air blown in from Japan.

Who was the architect? What was the exact date of the building?

The surroundings help little. The area--way outside the erstwhile circle of Spanish, let alone medieval, walls--in front of it has a covered civic-run market founded in the 1920s, while the adjacent area was occupied by a chapel already at least by the early 11th century, and the church--San Pietro in Sala--was raised to a kind of "head parrish" status by San Carlo Borromeo (one of Milan's most famous sons, having been active in the Council of Trent, then in implementing its precepts...so rigorously, that male adherents [I desist from saying "members"] of the Humiliati religious group, deserving of a message of its own another day, tried to assassinate him). The local population continued to 'increase and multiply,' and so a new church was begun in the early 19th century, though only finished and dedicated in the 1920s. Too long a time span to be of help.

"Aaaah," I said smugly to myself, "surely my book on Liberty architecture in Milan will have all the info I need to look like a smartie pants."

Think again.

It tells me nothing, except the address number in Piazza Wagner (4/6), which I hadn't observed, already.

"Oh, O.K, then there's always my OTHER book on Liberty in Milan...."

...which I apparently don't own, but was sure I did (oh man, another excuse to buy a book...it's a conspiracy!).

So, at least for the moment, no info on the architect, and nothing but stylistic observations to date the building to the very end of the 19th-early 20th centuries, which is pretty subjective.

I snapped these shots with you in mind on the 19th of February, 2011, around 1 P.M.

If you'd like to use the balcony design as a repeating motif in a needlepoint, or cross-stitch, project, see Monday's post on my blog on needlepoint: Ars acupicturae stellae - Star's Needlepoint Art, http://arsacupicturaestellae.blogspot.com/2011/03/balcony-for-border-milan-monday-23.html.

Have fun!