Monte degli Ulivi, Building complex and Italian national heritage in Riesi, Italy.
Monte degli Ulivi is a building complex on a hillside in Riesi, Sicily, made up of six modernist structures. The compound covers educational spaces, residential buildings, a library, and areas for vocational training.
The complex was built between 1963 and 1966 as an outreach initiative by the Waldensian Church to create a community center in Sicily. Architect Leonardo Ricci designed it to bring together education and shared living in a region where such services were largely absent.
The complex brings together people of different ages around shared activities like study, work, and daily life. Visitors can see how classrooms, a library, and common living spaces are arranged to support this way of living together.
The site is best visited on foot, as the buildings are spread across a hillside and the paths between them are part of the experience. Moving slowly lets you take in both the architecture and the surrounding groves of olive and almond trees.
The roofs of the buildings follow the slope of the hill with curved, white-plastered concrete forms that were shaped directly around the terrain. This approach, developed in the 1960s, was at the time an unusual way to let the ground guide the shape of a modern building.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 60,000 contributors worldwide.
