outside in

Thomas Siffer and Els Lybeer have created a modernist masterpiece that celebrates its beautiful surroundings

- Kara O'Reilly

One day we thought, “If we love it that much in Italy, why don’t we move there?”’ says Thomas Siffer, who, with his wife Els Lybeer, relocated to Puglia nine years ago. They had spent the previous 24 months travelling between their Puglian holiday retreat and their hometown of Ghent in Belgium. Ending up in this beautiful part of southern Italy was happenstance. ‘Els had been looking out for a holiday home and bought a property we loved. We didn’t care where it was; it happened to be in Puglia,’ explains Thomas.

Then, after a while of calling their holiday retreat home, the couple made an even bigger decision – to build a house. The catalyst for this decision? The pair found a plot in four acres of olive groves with a ramshackle ruin of a farmhouse on site. They knew it had potential. So, in collaboration with their friend, Armand Eeckels, from Ghent-based architecture firm NU Architectuuratelier, they renovated the farmhouse and stable, adding a new building and turning it all into a modernist masseria (a traditional farmhouse complex built around an inner courtyard). The complex is designed in such a way that part of it is used as a holiday rental.