Architect Giusto Puri Purini dies at 79, known for Farnesina renovation

Giusto Puri Purini, the Italian architect and designer known for the 1998 renovation of Rome's Palazzo della Farnesina, died at age 79 in Corsano, Italy. Born in Rome in 1944, he began his career as a set designer for Roberto Rossellini's TV films before earning a degree in architecture in Venice. He collaborated with architects Gepy and Maurizio Mariani and founded his own studio, Puri Purini, in 1978. Puri Purini designed numerous private villas in Italy and abroad, including for celebrities in Rome and the Lazio coast, and iconic nightclubs Gilda and Alien in 1990s Rome. Internationally, he worked for sultans in Saudi Arabia, designed the Italian Embassy in Stockholm, and created showrooms in US cities from the 1980s. In 2009, he contributed to rethinking the city of Auroville in Tamil Nadu, India, and participated in utopian projects like the Città del Sole in Ecuador. He also worked on the Expo in Lisbon (1998) and Hanover (2000), and designed a self-sufficient pyramid-shaped scientific laboratory at the foot of Mount Everest with the CNR. Puri Purini collaborated with Italian artists Tano Festa, Arnaldo Pomodoro, Franco Angeli, Gino Marotta, and Piero Dorazio. He curated the exhibition "Da Giotto a Malevich, 800 anni di rapporti tra l'Italia e la Russia" at the Scuderie del Quirinale in 2004. His funeral will be held on August 23, 2023, in Tricase at the Church of San Domenico.