Villa Isola 3.15

Villa Isola is an art-deco building in the northern part of Bandung, the capital of West Java province of Indonesia. Overlooking the valley with the view of the city, Villa Isola was completed in 1933 by the Dutch architect Wolff Schoemaker for the Dutch media tycoon Dominique Willem Berretty, the founder of the Aneta press-agency in the Dutch East Indies. The original purpose of the building was for Berretty's private house, but then it was transformed into a hotel after his death and now it serves as the headmastership office of the University of Education Indonesia.ConstructionVilla Isola was constructed within six months, which was quite fast at that time. The foundation was built of steel and concrete was used to fill the skeleton and the floors between iron bars. The Villa Isola complex consists of the building itself and two large gardens and it covered an area of about.The total cost to build the complex was about 500,000 guilders, despite the fact that Dominique Berrety almost went bankrupt. The building was celebrated during the opening ceremony in December 1933. Berretty invited several journalists and friends to show his new villa. The guests were impressed by the meticulous details of the decoration. The rooms were filled with warm furniture, Venetian crowns and paintings of famous Indies and western painters. There were a reception room, a dining room, a wide billiards room, a study room, sleeping rooms, family room with a balcony, open terraces at both west-east sides, and a cozy bar equipped with a movie projector. A placard with "M’ISOLO E VIVO" sign is adorned on the wall above the reception room.