Semi-underground house models as new concepts for urban sustainable environment

The underground and semi-underground construction is a building type whose traces are lost in the past: from Cappadocia to Jordan, man has left us countless testimonials of dug cities that, today, respond more adequately to the climatic problems. It is surprising to see how a building type, which has its roots in the remote past is today able to satisfy the needs of energy saving and of architectural forms which are continuously evolving. The peculiarity of this type is the capacity to relate to the ground morphology by inserting in a “non- violent way” but adapting to the pre-existent conformity. Therefore, in a local mountainous context like Basilicata, land in southern Italy, whose building tradition is the semi-underground construction, a project experience such as that proposed in this paper can be the cue for a revitalization of the urban contest.