A building doesn't have to be a dry and dead thing. Italian artist Giuliano Mauri's epic Cattedrale Vegetale (or Tree Cathedral) is the perfect example of architecture that, instead of competing with or complementing nature, is quite literally a part of it. The late artist's two groves of trees are destined to grow into a pair of magnificent basilicas.
The framework columns seen in these photos will eventually rot away and decay, to be replaced by the hornbeam trees planted in the center of each frame. As these grow, their canopies will mesh together to form the vaulted ceiling of a Gothic cathedral.
Mauri, who passed in 2009, laid the groundwork for his first visionary cathedral in Valsugana, Italy in 2002. The framework of the cathedral at the foot of Mount Arera in the northern Italian region of Lombardy was completed in 2010.
Image credits: Virtual Sacred Space
Image credits: Michele Salmaso
Image credits: Aldo Fedele (left) | Arte Sella (right)
Image credits: Pava
Image credits: Arte Sella
Image credits: Ettore Galata Rizzardini
Image credits: Pava
Image credits: Giacomo Bianchi
Image credits: Riccardo Senia
Image credits: Pierangelo Zavatarelli
Image credits: Marco Rosato
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Image credits: Il Giardino Sfumato