Dalla casa all'abitacolo. Umberto Riva, La petite chambre, XXI Triennale di Milano, 2016

This article examines the enduring trope of the “primitive hut” in order to interrogate the conditions under which a dwelling may foster human happiness in the contemporary context. It reconstructs a genealogy extending from Vitruvius and Marc-Antoine Laugier, through Henry David Thoreau’s Walden cabin, to Le Corbusier’s Cabanon, before concentrating on Umberto Riva’s La petite chambre, realised for the XXI Triennale di Milano (2016). The analysis contends that the hut’s traditional associations with origins and the natural world remain critically relevant. Riva’s 16 m² cedar-clad enclave, conceived without a client, functions less as a prototype than as a personal sanctuary that converts material paucity into architectural critique. The project demonstrates that subtraction can assume both ethical and poetic valences. Riva orchestrates space through gesture and light: a low entrance block incorporating a curved bathroom decompresses the principal rectangle, while diagonal incisions and attenuated slits disrupt orthogonality, guiding the inhabitant through a sequence of mutable vistas and chiaroscuro effects. Built-in birch furnishings (bed, table, kitchenette) align with these spatial vectors, encouraging exploration rather than mere occupation, while untreated cedar boards weather over time, exuding resinous aromas and registering seasonal change. The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed the propensity of hyper-connected dwellings to erode intimacy, thereby reasserting the importance of silence, proportion and contact with nature.