Corsica Traditional Houses and Architecture

The traditional Corsican house, referred to as a casa ('the house'), is made of stone, the most accessible building material on what is essentially a mountain of Granite & Schist in the Mediterranean.

Traditional Corsican village houses are built close to one another. This occurs due to the strong family links between the inhabitants of a same village. The first time that you visit a typical Corsican village it may appear very disorganised but there is an actual real world motivation behind the layout and position of the houses.

This type of property generally has between 3 and 6 storeys, with the stairs often being outside the house to maximise internal living space. Windows are small to protect from the rigours of the Corsican weather.

On the roofs there are wide thin schist tiles called teghje in the local dialect. These can be of grey-blue colour (in the town of Corte), green (Bastia) or silver grey (Castagniccia). In some areas, these classic tiles can be seen widely. The walls are generally whitewashed and typically Mediterranean in their look.

The classic stone house in the Corsica region of France is similar in appearance to a Mas. The front façade generally has no shutters, no curtains and the decoration is very simple. It is not rare to see a cellar and an oven attached to the house on the ground floor.

Corsican houses are pretty rare since the locals generally refuse to sell them or even to rent them. Corsica properties are indeed one of the most important sign of the traditional culture in this region of France.