Hylonicum

Light and residues, by Nicola Polloni

Urban Schematics

Thresholds

Thresholds mark boundaries: between a house and the street, between one space and another, between outside and inside. In this sense, a door or a window is an element of contradiction. Its nature appears primarily defensive: a door exists to prevent entry to those who are not meant to enter. Yet this function of closure is accompanied by a wholly opposite one, that of welcoming those who enter the building. This structural tension between opening and closure is expressed in the message that every threshold implicitly conveys: a joyful welcome, an anxious call, a disdainful opulence, an austere distance. In this sense, thresholds are proper accidents of the structures to which they belong and of the streets onto which they open: they tell us something about them without defining their essence, and yet they can only exist within them and shape their existence in a unique way. Often noticed only through their minimal function, thresholds become the protagonists of this sequence.

Open wooden double doors in an arched doorway framing a terrace, the sea and the distant horizon.
Irregular façade assembled from mismatched doors and panels around a narrow central wooden entrance.
Building façade covered by repeated rows of tall narrow windows arranged in a regular grid.
Tall ornate stone portal opening through a monumental façade onto a sequence of inner archways.
Upward view of two large curved window canopies projecting symmetrically from a façade.
Two adjacent dark wooden doors set into a plain weathered wall, each with a different surround.
Dark ornamental archway framing a courtyard and the façade of a traditional building beyond.
Monumental double door covered with rows of relief panels and surrounded by densely carved stone decoration.
Broad dark entrance cut into a worn white brick façade, with signs beside the opening.
Large carved wooden double doors enclosed by an elaborate curved stone portal.
Weathered wooden door set within a semicircular stone arch beneath a fan-shaped metal grille.
Closed wooden double doors beside a pale wall with an irregularly shaped framed opening above a bench.
Three contrasting ground-floor entrances beneath balconies, with a bicycle and plants beside the central doorway.
Symmetrical historic façade with shuttered windows, a small balcony and a central dark doorway.

Places and dates
Leuven, 2022; Milazzo, 2024; Beijing, Istanbul, and Novara di Sicilia, 2025; Benevento, České Budějovice, Lecce, Messina, Prague, Siena, and Taormina, 2026.