The sanctuary is designed as a composition of concrete buildings with distinctive detailing set in gardens with water features. It has been described as “both a meditation on death and an evocation of a particular magical city, Venice. Scarpa has been quoted as saying “I like water very much, perhaps because I am Venetian …”
Scarpa began designing this addition to the existing municipal cemetery of San Vito d’Altivole in 1968. Although he continued to consider changes to the project, it was completed before his accidental death in Japan in 1978. Several discrete elements comprise the family burial site: a sloped concrete enclosing wall, two distinct entrances, a small chapel, two covered burial areas (the arcosolium for Giuseppe and Onorina Brion, and one for other family members). The “viewing device” of the pavilion of meditation suggests a vesica pisci, a recurring motif in Scarpa’s architecture. Venetian influences such as the gold tiles familiar from Byzantine mosaics and Japanese influences such as the tea-room inspiration of the chapel are evident in the design. In the garden are a dense grove of cypresses, a prato (lawn), and a private meditation/viewing pavilion, separated from the main prato by a separate and locked entrance, and a heavily vegetated reflecting pool.
