PORTO CERVO

Porto Cervo did not exist before 1962. A consortium led by the Aga Khan bought a stretch of empty Gallura coast and built a resort from nothing, with an architectural code so strict it forbade straight lines and right angles. The result is a village that was invented whole and still refuses to look like it.

What was already here is the granite. Gallura is a granite country, and the wind has spent a long time sculpting the boulders along this coast into shapes that look deliberate and are not. They sit above water so clear the boats appear to be floating on nothing.

The umbrella pines were planted. The bay was not. The towel gives the rock the weight it deserves, because the granite will be here long after the marina is a historical curiosity.