Co-Net Project: A redevelopment project for the Former Fish Market in the Greco District of Milan

RE-FORM PERIPHERALS : “CO-NET” PROJECT “A redevelopment project of the Former Fish Market in the Greco District of Milan” Alarico Ruffino Architecture, Built Environment & Construction Engineering Department, Polytechnic of Milan, Via Bonardi 9, 20133 Milan, Italy alarico.ruffino@mail.polimi.it

Abstract This paper investigates the relationship between the built environment and the architectural project, in particular with reference to the conservation and redevelopment of existing buildings and the development of social welfare, understood as a project activity aimed at improving the living conditions of the most fragile social classes. The structure of the paper is divided into three parts. The first part is a synthesis and critical analysis of three bibliographic sources, three books concerning the themes of architectural theory, building typology and social housing in the Western context. The books are: “New urban housing. Shared living in Europe ”by Stefano Guidarini,“ The Variations of Identity: The type in architecture ”by Carlos Martí Arís and“ The Twentieth Century City ”by the Italian academic Bernardo Secchi. The second part of the paper exposes the part of the architectural project which I made during an Architectural Design workshop at the Politecnico di Milano (project group: Sofia di Bernardo, Giulia Fratangelo, Ruffino Alarico, Martina Salari), indicating the different phases of the design and the graphic drawings made. The project concerns the redevelopment of an urban lot near the Milano Centrale railway station, in Italy. The chosen project area is partially occupied by an existing building built in the early 1900s, which served as the neighborhood fish market and still has an interesting concrete structure with articulated shapes. The project concerns on the one hand the architectural redevelopment of the market, for which the function and intended use are transformed, and on the other hand the design of new residential buildings for fragile and needy social groups and student cohousing. Finally, the third and final part concerns the general conclusions and considerations of the project.

Keywords: Welfare, Architectural regeneration and conservation, Social housing, Urban strategy

Index Part I: Book Report

Part II: Project Practice

“New urban housing. Shared living in Europe”, Stefano Guidarini. Reading report

RE-FORM PERIPHERALS : “CO-NET” PROJECT

“The Variations of Identity: The type in architecture”, Carlos Martí Arís. Reading report “The Twentieth Century City”, Bernardo Secchi.

Reading report

A redevelopment project of the Former Fish Market in the Greco District of Milan, Italy.

Part III: Conclusions

PART I. - Reading reports “New urban housing. Shared living in Europe”. Reading Report.

Author: Stefano Guidarini Publisher: Biblioteca universitaria Publication date: September 2018

Abstract: To date, housing extends to issues concerning the city, public space and the participation of cultural and social life calling into question areas such as urban and participatory policies, architectural and urban design, social management, building technology, energy and transport, economic planning, service design, philosophy and communication. The new settlements are therefore to be understood in a multifunctional way, with entrepreneurial activities that generate social inclusion, cultural and productive activities that promote small businesses, services open to the neighborhood, for housing and intended for residents. At the basis of social living there is a path of ideas that began in the 1950s to overcome the urban theories of the modern movement and, therefore, to design a new city. The major precursors were De Carlo, Bakema, the Smithson brothers, Van Eyck (members of Team 10) and others such as Jacobs, Lynch, Venturi - characters responsible for the CIAM crisis.

Keywords: Urban Housing, Shared Living

1. The bourgeois house between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries The bourgeois house often refers to a single property, to a family who promoted its con-

struction, lived in it and rented the other apartments. It was based on the values of private property and privacy and featured few common spaces. However, it presented two important elements that contemporary social living practices are trying to replicate: social biodiversity and the ability to adapt to multiple uses, thanks to the simplicity of its distribution system based on corridor and rooms on both sides. In the first post-war period it spread in the form of a “condominium”, hence the division of properties within the buildings. With the development in height, then, there was an extension of the “typical floor” and the inversion of the initial hierarchy (first rich on the ground floor and poor in the attics - then rich on the top floor and poor on the ground floor).

2. The house of the “Existenzminimum” At the end of the Great War, the need to solve the pressing demand for housing brought to the fore the need to think of a small housing market with high functionality characteristics, in order to generalize the right to housing to the less affluent masses of citizens.

The experiments carried out in those circumstances led to the construction, in the city of Frankfurt, of “Siedlungen”, residential complexes built on the outskirts of various German cities characterized by essentiality and formal schematization, maximum openness to the outside, rigorously functional layout of the roads and general services . The studies of German functionalism of the 1920s and 1930s (Gropius and Klein) dealt with the theme of minimal housing and introduced a system of measures and floor plans designed to ensure survival. The house maintains the domestic conception of the nineteenth-century bourgeois house, which is however adapted to different design parameters.

Fig. 1 Frankfurt am Main 1925-1930, Siedlung.

3. The “banal house” - of the wealthy social class The combination of influences (casa bourgeois and Existenzminimum) led, towards the 1980s, to the type of Italian “banal house” which found widespread diffusion. The buildings become “fake light”, with semi-transparent facades where the green takes on the role of make-up of the building volumes. Typological research is absent and the apartments are completely conventional, with common and distribution spaces reduced to a minimum. Living roomkitchenette - hallway - sleeping area are required, with sizes varying between two-room and three-room apartments, with no flexibility of use.

4. The “anti-domestic” house Towards the beginning of the Sixties, a vision of the house as an urban municipality, as a place of mixed uses, of creative work, collective life, as an exhibition and meeting space, which denies any form of exclusion, begins to assert itself,

especially in the New York area. . We move on to the idea of ​​Sharing home which finds perfect coincidence with a new availability: the sheds.

The Loft was born and established itself, a largearea studio house consisting of a single room, greater heights and large windowed surfaces. the Loft is the negation of functionalism, the use of the house is only one of the activities that can be carried out there. It can be called the new typology of the 21st century. Jean Nouvelle, in France, proposes the Loft model to create social living spaces with spontaneous industrial warehouse finishes, bordering on the unfinished but with 40% more surface area and a wide use of double and triple heights. An important project by Moma which, in 1999, interprets the reconfiguration of the domestic landscape as an exhibition (The Un-Private House).

One constant is the spread of the workspace in the home (a. Small Office, Home Office b. Jian Wai Soho Project - Riken Yamamoto projects).

The Soho typology is characterized as a 21-meter side tower with a distribution block in one corner. Solution that allows greater free surface in the center. This project anticipates

Fig. 2 Jian Wai Soho Project, Chaoyang District, Beijing, 2004.

the issues of housing sharing in the Swiss Cluster-Wohnungen.

5. The flexible and multipurpose house The theme of flexibility is one of the fundamental requirements of any design program, in some cases turning into an unattainable paradox or myth. This is because it clashes with the dissection of horizontal plant engineering and with the economic costs necessary to obtain complete reversibility which, in many cases, is destined not to be exploited. A theme that runs through the entire history of architecture, including the modern movement. Mies Van Der Rohe speaks in favor of the neutrality of space, basing the concept of flexibility on the clarity of the structure (Building at the Weissemhof in Stuttgart and Lake Shore Drive apartments in Chicago, which show great adaptability to different lifestyles).

Subsequently, Van Eyck and Hertzberger expressed themselves, on the contrary, against the idea of ​​neutrality of space, arguing that it was a lack of identity. The latter identifies an

important conceptual distinction: versatility (ability of a space to lend itself to different uses without changing the architectural form, even during the day) and flexibility (ability of a space to be easily modified to meet new needs) . Therefore, designing according to flexibility means giving the client the possibility to choose what type of accommodation to have, before being built. Louis Kahn, on the other hand, defines a precise distinction between main spaces and serving spaces, determining a structural, formal and typological hierarchy.

Open Building concept: it is a disciplinary method of interpretation and design of the physical environment that favors the participation and adaptation of the elements.

Based on different levels of intervention in the built environment, from the concepts of Support and Infill. The idea that the inhabitants can influence design decisions is strong.

This theory is the basis of the most recent residential interventions by resident cooperatives in German-speaking Switzerland.

4 principles of adaptability have been identified

(3 referring to the building and 1 to the urban context): 1) idea of ​​a house that can be modified by the inhabitants through different furnishing arrangements; 2) provision of additional rooms that can be used in combination with existing apartments; 3) buildings with relatively small footprint and flexible systems; 4) urban flexibility, therefore the application of Open Building concepts for the definition of a type of settlement where buildings can be replaced without altering the overall urban layout.

Today’s residential architecture programs require typological flexibility, versatility and distribution flexibility. Helmut Wimmer has developed a concept of flexibility that is not linked to movable walls but, rather, is linked to an absolute structural clarity and organization of spaces. The combination of simple structure and freedom of use seems to be the most convincing choice in the contemporary era. Along this trend also the thought of Kazuyo Sejima and Nishizawa (SANAA) who interpret the theme of flexibility as the freedom

Fig. 3 SANAA’s Completed Maréchal Fayolle Housing Complex in Paris, 2020.

of use that everyone can have through intangible elements such as suggestion and information, even arriving at unexpected results. To obtain this type of flexibility, any type of hierarchy between architectural elements, between partitions and structure, between distribution spaces and use spaces is eliminated. In many spaces designed by SANAA, the rooms have similar dimensions and a distribution without hierarchies. The elimination of the hierarchies leads to the idea of ​​a polyvalent neutral plant characterized by: a series of rooms with a surface that allows different uses (16-18 m2), a sufficiently wide distribution corridor (> 150 cm) to be furnished, an eat-in kitchen , regular facade with uniform openings, continuous loggia.

6. Social Housing ante-litteram Phalanstére: common-type model, experimental building for the Falange (made in France). Based on the concepts of association and cooperation in a new socio-economic structure alternative to that of the industrial society of the time. But the roots of contemporary associated life can be found, above all, in the idea of ​​Kropotkin (Russian anarchist), decidedly contrary to the Phalanstery model in favor of a “theory of mutual aid”, based on principles of economic cooperation - the latter will have great influence on the founding of the cooperative communities of Zurich. In Switzerland, initiatives are being developed that corresponded to a social idea of​​ subsidiarity and a concept of collective well-being strongly rooted in the post-industrial revolution Swiss socio-cultural climate (Amerikaner Haus by Schwank, Frauenkolonie Lettenhof by Guyer are examples of profound attention to the vulnerable of population). The first settlements provided common services such as mechanical laundry and central heating, collective kitchens and a dining room common to the inhabitants.

7. Shared living in Switzerland: a realized utopia The first housing cooperatives in Zurich date back to 1907, starting from already deeply rooted social experiences. Allgemeine Baugenossenschaft Zurich was founded in 1916 and later became Switzerland’s largest housing cooperative.

Following the crisis of the Eighties and Nineties, in Zurich, the search for a different way of being in the world was initiated through the construction of communities of inhabitants (research strongly inspired by the Swiss anarchist utopian thought and by the philosopher Widmer). Widmer, Blum and others, in 1993, then laid the foundations of the cooperative Bau-und Genossenschaft Kraftwerk 1 whose principles are diversity, equality, openness, solidarity, sovereignty, sustainability and justice, synergy and volunteering.

8. Cluster-Wohnungen and participation In Zurich, new forms of living were born and established themselves that undermined the bourgeois lifestyle and the concept of apartments.

Cluster Wohnungen is the most significant result of a long process that has led future inhabitants

Fig. 4 Floor plan of a cluster apartment

to define their own housing needs by asking questions without anticipating solutions.

They consist of small independent housing units (consisting of one or two bedrooms with bathroom, mini kitchen) connected by a common area (more articulated and composed of various rooms). This type allows the common use of more fendi areas with savings in the use of space and, for this reason, the rent for a base unit costs less. The underlying principle is against the separation of genders, intergenerational residences are configured for young people, adults and the elderly. The idea is to live in a small space and be able to use more.

These interventions are based on the concept of undivided ownership. The inhabitants are not only rented but are members of the cooperative, they hold shares and in this way everyone is responsible for the activities and management of the common spaces. These new housing models propose an evolved economic model that goes beyond the residence in different forms; there are entrepreneurial activities, management of spaces for culture and work, residence services, support activities for the elderly and disabled.

The functional programs are very complex and articulated.

9. Conclusions The interest in these new forms of housing is also due to the fact that a new paradigm seems to emerge from these experiences on the basis of criteria that tend to favor a distributive situationism over typological purity. There is an anti-typological view that leads to the almost systematic disappearance of the socalled standard plan. None of the buildings presented have a floor equal to the other. They would appear to be projects with functions left to the randomness of the market when this is not the case and, on the contrary, the functions are studied and discussed, approved precisely for their specific role in a given point. In the design of the interior spaces, the day-night distinction has also completely disappeared in favor of freer aggregations, with great attention to the articulation of living spaces, kitchens and dining areas. The collaborative housing model is expanding in Europe. In Italy, despite a concept of living rooted in very traditional values, even from a regulatory point of view, there are some cases that address the issue of sharing housing.

Summarizing some fundamental principles of the contemporary living project, 15 points can be defined: 1) think of the settlement in terms of urban construction and not as subdivision 2) overcome the concept of self-sufficient housing and neighborhood because nothing is self-sufficient 3) underline the importance of the intermediate spaces of the residence 4) build settlements where open spaces are for public use without fences

5) provide open spaces fed by multiple activities of public interest 6) provide for an efficient management capable of promoting, organizing and conducting activities of common interest 7) build neighborhoods in which social management is consistent with the settlement principle 8) privilege access to use rather than possession 9) designing houses that can be reasonably modified over time (flexible and multifunctional) 10) making houses for different types of users 11) reuse or replace existing buildings (often having to adapt to types of spaces gives rise to new types) 12) generate conditions for living in a small space, being able to use a lot of it 13) maintain the possibility of community life and privacy 14) not to demonize the car but to favor sustainable mobility 15) create energetically aware and ecologically sustainable settlements.

“The Variations of Identity: The type in

The type is:

architecture”. Reading Report.

1) of a conceptual nature;

Author: Carlos Martí Arís

2) a logical statement;

Publisher: Cosa Mentale Publication date: 1993

Abstract: From a typological perspective, form is seen in its most essential character, as something akin to the very structure of the human mind: “form is the bearer of meaning”.

The architectural type is defined by the presence of a formal invariant which manifests itself in different examples and is located at the level of the deep structure of the form. The idea of type is therefore presented as a cognitive procedure through which the reality of architecture reveals its essential content and, at the same time, as an operational method that forms the basis of the design act itself, defining a discourse centered on this. which constitutes the reality of architecture.

Keywords: Architectural typology, Typological

3) refers to the formal structure.

Victor Hugo on type and style in architecture: “The great buildings, like the great mountains, are the work of the centuries. Often art is transformed when they are not yet completed, nevertheless the work continues peacefully according to the transformed art. The new art takes the monument where it finds it, there he encrusts it, if he assimilates it, develops it according to his imagination and if he can, he carries it out, all following a natural and tranquil law.

The internal skeleton, the logical arrangement of the parts, is the type. The style links architecture to history, to a concrete phase of the development of material culture, to certain construction tools and techniques. The type expresses the permanence of its essential aspects and highlights the invariable character of certain formal structures, which act as fixed points in the becoming of architecture “.

evolution, History of Architecture

1. The idea of type as an epistemological foundation of architecture If we stick to the meaning that the term type has in non-specialized language, we see that it is equivalent to a general form or a set of properties that are common to a certain number of individuals or objects (type synonymous with class, family ...). The creation of types depends on the criterion by which the classification is made. In architecture: the formal structure of the architectural object is considered as an analytical key that returns the peculiar nature of architecture. An architectural type is a statement that describes a formal structure.

Giorgio Grassi on Type and historicity: “The examples of a more remote and more recent past confront each other on the level of their form, above the human and economic, political and religious reasons to which they are mostly made to correspond. Through the idea of​​ type we seek knowledge of architecture that is indifferent to chronology. History and typology present themselves as two complementary aspects, since, while history shows the processes in transformation, the typological analysis refers to what remains identical. Both aspects relate to one another. the other, only mutation makes permanence visible. Type has a timeless character. Type is a product of the human mind.

Architectural types result from our effort to make the deep structure of the material world recognizable and intelligible. Type is a product of human labor capable of understanding reality and endowing it with an order through architecture. They transform and germinate in the soil of experience s toric “.

The cognitive dimension of architecture: Scientific work is configured as an integral part of creative thinking, as it brings to light aspects of reality that were not visible before. Each scientific formulation constitutes a creative act, involves an interpretation and requires a personal stance, from which the data and observations take on a precise significance and significance. Science applies abstract principles and universal laws, but the world of architecture is made up of physical objects: how can an experience based on specific facts give rise to general knowledge? We need to focus on language.

Through this analysis we recognize 3 broad categories

of universal concepts of architecture: 1. The material elements or parts of the building, which involve a construction process; 2. The formal relationships between these elements (morphology); 3. The architectural types, which allude to a structure, to a recognizable order.

These elements and relations constitute the type: an ordering principle according to which a series of elements, governed by precise relations, acquire a certain structure.

According to Karl R. Popper, the distinction between objectivity and subjectivity of thought forms the “Theory of the three worlds”: reality is made up of three worlds, the first is the world of physical objects, the second the world of subjective experiences, the third the world of statements and theories in themselves, of the objective contents of thought. The three worlds can interact with each other, but the intermediate step must always pass through world 2. Translated into architecture: world

Fig. 5 Giorgio Grassi, Recovery plan of the historic center of Teora, Italy, 1981

1 is made up of all works of architecture, whether built or designed; world 2 is formed by the mental activity of the architect; world 3 is made up of the disciplinar y corpus of architecture. To go from 1 to 3, or vice versa, you have to go through 2, the sense of the path from 1 to 3 is the analysis, from 3 to 1 is the project.

2. Permanence and transformation of types Classification and typology : The typological analysis has a significant affinity with the classification procedures.

Typology and classification cannot be considered equivalent methods in the strict sense, since they differ in strategies and objectives. If the main objective of a classification is to establish differences, the typology is engaged in the search for similarities or structural links.

Fig. 6 Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, 562 AD.

Typological crossings: The types do not close in watertight compartments, but intertwine with each other, favoring the proliferation of objects.

Hybridization, superimposition and intersection as typical procedures of creative thinking. The typological analysis must not be limited to the canonical examples that represent the idea of type, ​​ but must include the whole range of variants and combinations in which different typological ideas are compared and intertwined. The value of architecture can be expressed both in the purity and uniqueness of the rule, and in the fertility of its multiple and impure combinations. The Hagia Sophia is a perfect example of the typological intersection.

Form and utility : The sense of form does not end in satisfying a function, but encompasses it and surpasses it, acquiring its own autonomy. This does not

mean that the form that constitutes the type is an abstract form, on the contrary the forms of architecture are manifestations of the ways of life and of the relationship of man with his environment. Historical experience clearly shows that the form is more durable than any of its uses. In certain historical cycles, links between forms and uses are consolidated, therefore in a certain period certain forms are linked to some concrete activities. For example, the basilica form, which was translated from public activities, in Roman times, to religious worship activities in the transition to Catholicism. An architectural form cannot be understood from its utility. The scientific knowledge of architecture is given by the sense of forms, utility is the condition for the manifestation of architecture.

principle for which a series of elements linked by particular relationships acquire a specific structure. Structuralism is a method of analyzing phenomena aimed at determining the structure, on the assumption that their principle of formation and intelligibility lies in it. The structural method consists in investigating the common structure of different heterogeneous systems. Semiotics can be defined as the general science of all communication systems; however, the communicative aspect is not relevant to the nature of architecture, an analysis of this type is of little use to the architect. The role of architecture is to reflect the use for which it is intended, that is, the use itself is able to determine the form.

Type and place:

The structure is a totality that cannot be reduced to the sum of its components. We speak of structure in reference to a set of elements that are not independent from each other, but related according to different forms of articulation, interpenetration and solidarity through which it acquires a specific internal cohesion. Structuralism implies that a limited number of deep structures exist. The typological analysis penetrates into the phenomena to identify the formal constants presented. This correspondence leads us to pay attention to the analytical categories of the structural method.

Among these is the concept of transformation: the structure is something dynamic, in perpetual formation that incorporates new components into its processes. In it there is always a principle of self-regulation that ensures the maintenance of the laws that characterize it. As a result, architectural types are constantly forming structures, undergoing internal transformations. Thus distances are made from the idea of ​​the pure invention of form and from that of the determinism of the

By taking root in a specific space, architecture remains enveloped in the characteristics of the place, and is therefore literally unrepeatable.

Type and place are terms of a dialectical process through which architecture takes shape. The type represents the generic, universal and abstract dimension, while the place is identified with the particular, singular and concrete aspects. So if the type is generic, universal, when a building is concretely linked to a place, an indissoluble bond is formed, whereby the building deprived of its context loses meaning. The typological homogeneity that usually presides over the formation of a logo or the occupation of a territory arises from the identity of the ways of life.

3. Type and structure Critique of the semiotic approach: The architectural type is a statement that describes a formal structure, an ordering

The concept of transformation in architecture:

model, each architecture is therefore the result of a series of transformations carried out on other architectures.

Type as an elementary structure: Architectural types are nothing more than elementary architectural structures, irreducible cores that constitute the ultimate level of structural analysis. (eg basilica type, central, hypostyle ...). The processes that have made it possible to characterize the transformations of some monuments are those of variation, concatenation and superimposition. The type is assumed as the engine of an unlimited formal construction and the project is the context in which the interaction between types takes place.

The overlap is found in the architectures that aim at the integration of different components and aspects without losing the unitary character of the structure (for example the Casa del Fascio, which refers to Renaissance architecture). The concatenation exhibits the fragmentation and complexity of the components of architectures, without subjecting them to a single and global law. The variation consists in the unfolding of a thematic nucleus or elementary structure, through a series of variations that derive from it and that replicate and modify it.

Fig. 7 Casa del Fascio by Giuseppe Terragni, Como, Italy, 1936.

4. The notion of type in modern architecture The notion of type in modern architecture Monolithic versus decomposable: When we stop in front of a monument of the past we are able to recognize its typological matrix; unlike modern architectures, the matrix is ​​not grasped with the same clarity. This is due to the new epistemological state of the notion of type. In traditional architecture, the different subsystems that make up a building coincide and overlap in an exact and unambiguous way, clearly setting the typological form (monolithic character); in modern architecture all these subsystems can isolate and abstract themselves, be conceived in an autonomous way (analytical character). According to Le Corbusier, the monolithic character is defined by the Plan Paralysé, to which he contrasts his 5 points which are the expression of a new way of thinking about architecture. The decomposable character is given by technical innovations (skeleton structure) and cultural transformations: that is, the emergence of analytical and abstract thought.

A paradigm can be made between Palladio’s villas and those of Le Corbusier: in the first case the typological form tends to determine all the components by subjecting them to a static

Fig. 8 Comparison between “Ville Savoye” by Le Corbusier (left) and Villa “La Rotonda” by Palladio (right)

order, while, in the second case, the typological form operates as a device that frees strategies different, even conflicting ones, through which the building achieves a dynamic equilibrium.

Mies Van der Rohe in a typological key: “Architecture is for me a subjective art that comes from the spirit of the time. It is a discipline based on precise rules”. In Mies’s work there are unequivocal traces of a way of proceeding deeply linked to the idea of ​​type.

He affirms the value of architecture as a formal structure that guarantees overall adaptation to the activity that must be carried out in it.

His architecture bears no formal resemblance to that of the past. For him, technique has the function of filtering the subjective aspects and directing the project towards the clearest and most congruent solution, ensuring the harmony of architecture with its universal principles. The technique becomes the means to obtain the architectural form, which in his work tends to identify itself with the definition of the construction system, so that the loadbearing structure and the formal structure end up being equivalent (the characters of the type are present in the structure itself ).

The type and its transgression: The analysis of the work of the masters of modern architecture clearly demonstrates that the project is not conceived as an invention from scratch, but as a transformation of a pre-existing material. Each new project is the development of ideas implicitly present in previous works.

The transformations of a project operate on a pre-existing material that is drawn from a single source: the identity of the architecture.

We can refer to the typological series: a set of examples that refer to the same formal structure and are constituted through operations of transformation of previous examples. Having conceived the formal structural we can say that each building speaks to us not only of itself, but of all the others of which it represents a transformation.

5. Conclusions The peculiarity of typological thinking is the ability to establish an active relationship with the architecture of the past that allows us to grasp its relevance. The historical material is subjected to a radical process of abstraction, through which it is possible to identify its general and permanent characteristics. In this

way the historical material is no longer presented as a collection of finished and inert works. The constructive action of the type requires the presence of a logical principle capable of filtering architecture and abstracting from it exclusively that system of relations that constitutes its backbone. The conceptual character of the type is a necessary condition for formulating the transformation procedures through which the project is developed. All of Le Corbusier’s work is marked by an irresistible attraction for the great examples of the past. But the gaze that the architect turns to these is a typological gaze, almost an x-ray, with an enormous power of abstraction capable of stripping the architecture of its particular aspects to enhance the pure formal construction. The alternative between historicism and experimentalism can only be overcome in the context of a reconsideration of modern culture that does not neglect the aspects that have their roots in the substratum of tradition. Architecture should be understood as the result of the interaction and mutual fertilization of typological structures.

“The Twentieth Century City”. Reading Report.

Author: Bernardo Secchi Publisher: Editori Laterza

1. Expansion and dissolution of the city In European collective imaginaries, as in the eyes of scholars of many disciplines, the twentieth century, dominated by an expectation that slowly fades into

Publication date: 2005

fear, appears to be placed between two extremes:

Abstract:

boundless growth of the city and the fear of its

The twentieth century is caught between two anxieties: the unstoppable growth of the city and the fear of its dissolution. The century appears to be made up of three periods, largely overlapping one another. A first period in which the experience of the disciplinary society runs out and moves towards its moralization. The second is a period dominated by the search for the concrete dimensions of welfare. Finally, in the third, the results achieved are increasingly contradicted by a progressive aestheticization of individual and collective life. These three stories divide the time axis in different ways and focus on different issues. The first on certain phenomenal aspects: the growth and dissolution of the city. The second tries to show that the twentieth century city has transformed because construction practices have changed and the role of urban planning and architecture has not been irrelevant. The third period focuses on the role of the individual, and brings with it greater attention to everyday life and the corporeal dimensions of the city. The dividing lines of the periods do not coincide with the great events that marked the history of this period, even if these undoubtedly had profound consequences for the city and the territory of several countries.

At the heart of the three stories is the problem of individual freedom, that is, the different ideas of the relationship between the individual and society.

Keywords: Dispersion of the city, Town planning, Urban expansion, Welfare

the anguished expectation of an indefinite and disappearance, of its dissolution or transformation into forms of settlement of which it becomes difficult to divine the characters, the meaning and the destiny. Disquiet seems to go through the century and the city does not seem alien to it.

The growth of the European city appears to be an unstoppable phenomenon until at least all the 1960s, until the end of a period of strong development and modernization during which all European and Western countries were able to draw on the large demographic reserve of the rural world by transferring towards the industry and the city significant parts of populations for centuries dedicated to agricultural activities and immersed in more archaic cultures. The fear of the dissolution of the city, of Auflosung der Stiidte, instead takes shape and becomes a shared concern especially in the last decades of the century, when higher levels of well-being, new techniques and new organizational methods of production, new individual and collective behaviors contribute to strongly attenuate population transfers towards the north of the continent and towards urban areas and give rise to evident phenomena of settlement dispersion. However, expectation and fear do not build two periods demarcated by a clear boundary.

The symptoms of what will characterize the final years of the century, the fear of the dissolution of the city, are already evident in the passage between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the urban expansion that marked the first part of the century in Europe, following clear trends in the century. previous, it continues amplified in its final part in other areas of the planet. When viewed from this point of view, the twentieth century begins

well before its first calendar day and ends, in all likelihood, well beyond its last day, becoming a very long century.

2. The city of Siena Siena is considered the medieval city par excellence. Ancient centers are a fundamental part of the urban experience of the twentieth century, given the numerous operations undertaken for the conservation, restoration and reuse of its spaces and buildings. The ancient city has always exercised a unique charm and enhancement and imitation are fundamental elements of the urban policies of the various centuries. Considered by hygienists as an unhealthy part of cities, as well as dangerous and full of vices, many urban centers have been dismembered or subjected to radical demolition.

The ancient city appears, in comparison with the metropolitan expansion and the consequent tensions, as a true and faithful mirror of a society, often idealized and to which one looks with nostalgia. Twentieth-century reflection on the city of the past is much richer than it did in

Fig. 9 Piazza del Campo, Siena, Italy, 1200 AD

the past. The city of Siena has always amazed the common imagination, and anyone who has visited the city with curiosity and attention has been able to grasp a bundle of unique images that have endured over time. These images have created the common imagination, as well as the historical awareness for what Siena is.

Although the twentieth century was historically more aware than previous eras, it designed the city with an eye to the past and interpreting its lessons in banal and sophisticated ways. Siena offers three. The first consists in common experience, that is, in the collective interest for the ancient center. The second concerns the nature of the open space, that is squares, courtyards, gardens, etc. which has three main statutes: the public space, where the main collective rites take place and where the “walk” is one of the peculiar elements, the space open countryside, hills and in general the landscape seen from the walls, and from the space of the courtyards and the “secret space”, quiet and isolated places dedicated above all to idleness.

The last lesson on Siena concerns the grammar and syntax of the ancient urban text, that is, the

precise and regular composition of the whole and the building relationship with the morphology of the territory. Siena is seen as a unique example of a city, practically unconditioned by modernity and an example contrary to the condition of the city of the twentieth century, as here an attempt has been made to seek a collective utility for individual needs.

overcome

the

nineteenth-century

conception

of the urban fabric. The greatest contributions of this generation are certainly what are called “extreme efforts of the imagination”, namely the Villa Radieuse and Broadacre city, respectively a project by Le Corbusier and F.L. Wright. These two ideas, although contrasting and different on some points, both present a close connection between private space and common public space. For each

3. The end of the modern city

element, unique and specific characteristics are assigned. These are innovative projects where a

In the first post-war period, the “Great Generation”,

series of reflections and experiences converge as

that is, that group of architects and urban planners

well as taking positions towards the characters of

who had experienced the tragedy of trench warfare

society and the city matured in a long collective

and subsequent social tensions, hoped for a total

work. In a conscious way, urban planning is

change in society. The fundamental trait of these

therefore influenced by the Modern movement,

figures lies in the importance given to utopias, to

as happens in Frankfurt in the Ernst May project

which they want to give concrete dimensions. Their

and practically in all urban social housing projects

ideas and projects all have the same purpose: to

in Germany. The symbol of this influence are the

demonstrate the otherness of the ideas of the twentieth

Siedlungen, new parts of the city adjacent to the

century, compared to previous eras. According to the

large factories without anything separating them

exponents of these ideas, modernity will never end

from the pre-existing urban fabric. Experimentation

and the projects of architects and urban planners

in a theoretical key, in addition to that in a technical

will be able to contribute to it, as long as architecture

key, leads to divergences on the real political role of

and urban planning not only represent the values of ​​

architecture. In the CIAM councils, Le Corbusier’s

society, but are also instruments of transformation,

idea supported the apolitical role of architecture, as

liberation and equality. The goal of this movement

it improves the life of everyone without distinction,

consists in wanting to superimpose some of their

leads to a sort of split and the formation of small

ideas on existing cities to change their image and

separate groups. However, some exponents agree on

Fig. 10 Villa Radieuse (left) and Broadacre city (right)

the real usefulness of industrial production in the

is degraded. The grands ensembles are particularly

service of architecture. Taylorism and Fordism are

criticized due to some aspects: the arrangement

seen not only as methods to build faster, but also less

of the volumes, the building typologies, the scarce

tiring as the work is done in steps as in an assembly

assortment of shapes (there are only bars and

line. The worker could thus think of devoting time

towers) and in general the performance of the single

to other activities, especially in the common areas,

accommodation and the neighborhood. This type of

a theme dear to these architects. The work of these

dwelling was applied throughout Europe although

designers is inherited from other younger figures,

with very different characterizations, such as in

who develop interesting ideas, such as the Geneva

Italy and Scandinavia.

urban project of 1935 and above all the Amsterdam urban project, considered a symbolic plan of this

5. City, individual and society

period and a modern first floor.

This chapter deals with the search for individual

4. Les Hauts de Rouen

and collective well-being, a research that began and largely took place before the establishment of

Les Hauts de Rouen is one of several neighborhoods

the welfare state. Well-being, or welfare, is seen

that were built in France between the late 1950s

as a necessary dimension for the development of

and early 1960s. These works were built to cope

the twentieth century city. From the very basics

with the great demand for apartments, particularly

of economic science, social well-being has been

for factory workers, to modernize the construction

interpreted as a determining factor in the writings

industry and to build a city that fell within the

of economists and in the construction of economic

canons of modern urban planning. Since the early

policies in Western countries. Since the nineteenth

1960s, around 7 million homes have been built

century, the shortage of housing and the hygienic

in the “grands ensembles”. Made with industrial

conditions of large industrial cities prompted

methods, they form new cities far from the urban

movements of social reform and administrative

center located in peripheral locations.

actions aimed at improving the welfare of the less by

well-off social classes. Since the 1920s, the debate on

working-class families, but nowadays they are mostly

the issue has not been limited to theory or the actions

inhabited by non-EU citizens and the social context

of philanthropists alone, but has become a peculiar

Initially

the

neighborhood

was

inhabited

issue in the internal policies of many European nations. The various governments are taking action to guarantee aid to those sections of the population most in need through targeted operations, such as the distribution of economic aid or basic necessities.

Architecture and urban planning study well-being from the point of view of physical dimensions and many researches constitute a breeding ground for experimentation in this particular context. In fact, they anticipate the welfare state in all Western states. The projects of this type and of this period (‘900) differ in the care of the materials and above Fig. 11 Les Hauts de Rouen, France.

all in the spatial relationships that are undertaken between them. Although many of these researches

have not been completed and have, in some cases

Rotterdam in the Netherlands. The distribution and

resulted in confusion of ideas, one cannot fail to

mobility throughout this area are guaranteed by an

recognize the weight that urban planning has had

extremely efficient railway network, which makes

on the constitution of welfare. Teams of architects

the use of other means of locomotion superfluous.

and town planners recognize a design hierarchy

Due to the fact that within its territory there are,

that starts with the house. The study of the house

in addition to a very high number of houses,

is a fundamental practice for the well-being of the

some of the nerve centers of the world political

individual, which is then reapplied even in a larger

economic system, the NWMA is defined as the

key, for the design of public buildings or parks.

logistic platform of Europe. It is a new form of city,

All these elements are connected through their

the megacity. It is characterized by the lack of a

frequency and distribution in the urban fabric, they

dominant center with its own periphery, and looks

are places connected in time and space. Regarding

more like a large inhabited park. The most important

the home, two schools of thought are formed: the

activities are therefore not contained in the various

first argues that the house is an irrepressible need,

cultural centers, but are dispersed and disconnected

and its lack causes socio-political instability, while

within this system. Thanks to these characteristics,

for the second the home is nothing more than the

the NWMA presents itself at the same time as a

search for comfort. in the dimension of everyday life.

megacity, a global city and a world city.

However, this last idea is questioned, as the concept of comfort changes according to the situation. An

7. Conclusions

important experiment consists in the design of green spaces or in any case for sports activities. ‘open a healthy play activity, projects are commissioned that are strongly based on the type of function of the structure, so that the activity can be carried out in the best possible way. Urban greenery takes on more and more importance, given an operation of bringing nature closer to the city, the playgrounds, that is, parks designed especially for children, and connected to each other via avenues and paths.

6. NWMA (North Western Metropolitan Area) This is a particular type of settlement. From a political point of view, Belgium applied a policy aimed at avoiding the centralization of the large masses of the population. Thus the Belgian périphérie verte was built. The project consists in the dispersion of “self-sufficient” settlements over a very large territory, as it is possible to work on them as well as to find all the necessary services.

The area is included between the territories of Antwerp, Brussels, Gent and Leuven in Belgium and

Urban planning and architecture play the saving role of those who free society and cities from their ghosts, from their ailments. They play this role along two main directions: that of moralizing the legacy of previous centuries and that of building a radical alternative to the city of the past.

This anguish, this fear of the abyss implies two consequences: the first built on the experience of progressive urban concentration, the second on that of the fragmentation and dispersion of megacities. As the transport techniques and the diffusion of the automobile allowed it, the pressure on the central areas was tempered by the expansion of a vast suburb. The movement towards the suburbs and suburbs, with the diffusion of the automobile, above all, involves congestion and pollution of the densest parts of the cities. For this reason, during the first half of the century, projects that aim to expand the size and scale of the urban space take hold.

In the middle of the century, in the years of maximum diffusion of the automobile, the Buchanan report, after the study of some

English cities, comes to the conclusion that the solution of the problems generated by traffic congestion requires a radical redesign of the city. Concentration and dispersion become self-contradicting phenomena: each of the two causes the other. They ensure that the city is continually in search of a spatial balance.

The concluding chapter of the book focuses on the author’s considerations and on the question of the city in general. Secchi describes the twentieth century city through various images.

Initially he defines it as a physical representation of the idiorhythms of its inhabitants, where the space and time of the inhabitant was organized by the city itself, which is defined as an “urban machine.” With this figure, the author compares the movements of people to those of a pendulum, i.e. carried out in a systematic and regular manner. The various spaces and environments in which the inhabitant spent his life are defined and recognized. The book concludes with a reflection on the real abilities and possibilities of the urban planning historian today, making it clear the need to know how to describe what he defines a tension between word and event, in such a way as to grasp the truthful meaning.

PART II. - Project Practice RE-FORM PERIPHERALS - “CO-NET” PROJECT A redevelopment project of the Former Fish Market in the Greco District of Milan, Italy.

ban connection, but also a connection that the users of the project can benefit from in terms of social interactions.

Keywords: Building regeneration, Architectural recovery and renewal, Urban connection, Social Welfare

1. Analysis of the intervention area: The former Fish Market of Milan Market and architectural elements:

Fig. 9 Project Logo

Abstract: The term “Co-Net” wants to enclose the intentions that guided the development of the project, from the first phase of the strategy, to the definition of the detailed aspects. The play on words comes from the particle “co”, which refers to the concepts of “sharing”, “co-living”, “confronting” that are the basis of the choice for the functions, activities and variety of users that can be find within the project, consolidating itself as a real design philosophy in the development of spaces. The root is particularly recurrent in terms of English derivation such as co-housing, co-working, co-living, which find life both in the market and in the identity and rules that governed the development of residences. The term that joins the particle, “net”, translates as “network” and refers to the intention that governed the project strategy from the territorial scale to the local one: the creation of a network of physical connections, which can also be interpreted as a network of social relations linking areas of the city that are currently poorly connected.

The pun returns the sound of the term “connect”, which expresses the intention of an ur-

In the immediate vicinity of the Central Station and overlooking the Magazzini Raccordati, the building of the former fish market occupies part of the complex that once extended to almost entirely cover the block described by the Zuretti, Lesa and Sammartini streets, now home to the kitchens of Milan Catering.

Decommissioned for years, the market structure is in a state of neglect and decay, despite the fact that there are no shortage of hypotheses aimed at its reactivation through candidacy for participatory budget projects, or as a multipurpose place for socializing. The building, whose construction dates back to the mid-fifties, is divided into two levels above ground and a basement. The market is enclosed on all sides; the perception of the building in its overall configuration is hindered by the wall that surrounds it. On the side of Via Zuretti, the visual screen prevents the view of a large

Fig. 10 Historical photo: interior of the Market

Fig. 10 Eternal view of the market, north-west side

part of the east canopy, but allows a glimpse of the roof of the north one, of considerable architectural value.

The area adjacent to the building lot is populated weekly by the stalls of the neighborhood market, which extend along the entire Via Zuretti. The former market looks like an artifact almost out of scale with respect to the context, occupying the entire lot from via Sammartini to via Zuretti for a total of about 90 meters in length and 15 meters in height. The complex is in a reinforced concrete structure. As additions to the original structure there are two canopies (one on a long side and one on a short side of the Market) also in reinforced concrete that almost create a portico to embrace the complex, with interesting plays of light and shadows from the openings of the their covers.

The market, limited externally by the enclosure walls, is surrounded by a further ideal enclosure represented by the neighboring residential buildings; this second wall is presented as a continuous visual presence, a backdrop with which the market is related on two of its sides.

Artistic initiatives:

Fig. 11 Reinforced concrete canopy, west side

Fig. 12 Reinforced concrete canopy, north side

The project area is affected by recurring artistic initiatives, such as the Martesana public art exhibition “Montmartre”, promoted by the “Ponte degli Artisti” association. Recently the area has also been involved in a series of urban redevelopment projects which, relying on artists and students, have found in street art a means by which to combat the deterioration of the stains on the walls. In the photo, taken in the Goccia Park, at the end of Via Sammartini, the mural of the “Leave the Sign / 2” initiative is framed, which gives voice to the theme of combating racism and discrimination.

Fig. 13 View of the urban context from the second level of the Market

Landscape context:

2. Territorial Analysis

The Naviglio (stream, water channel) runs close to the project area, along which a cycle and pedestrian path built in the 1990s extends. The route starts from Cassina de ‘Pomm at the corner of via Melchiorre Gioia and extends for 30 km passing through the municipalities of Cologno Monzese, Vimodrone, Cernusco sul Naviglio, Cassina dei Pecchi, Bussero, Gorgonzola, Gessate, Inzago and Cassano d’ Adda. The cycle path runs alongside the right side of the canal through parks and inhabited centers.

Transportation system:

Fig. 14 Naviglio Martesana and cycle-pedestrian path

The analysis phase of the project area was initially concentrated on a territorial scale of the municipality of Milan, to better understand the urban context considered. It was developed on two fronts: the identification of the routes of three categories of roads (infrastructural, driveway and cycle path), and the presence of important green lungs to crown the urban border. The following maps (fig. 15) analyze the relationship of the road system, identifying main and secondar y roads in relation to the major public car parks, railway tracks and subway lines, cycle paths and green areas. The main sliding axes, cycle paths, railway and subway stations and also the main cultural, sporting, social, educational and health ser vices have been identified. The main modal interchange points were therefore identified, that is, the points characterized by the presence of multiple means of transport, such as the

subway, train, large underground car parks, but also cycle paths. They are therefore the points that are considered the most traveled, where people change means of transport. The identified nodes are also the main catalyst points of the internal and external flows of the city.

The following map (fig. 16) provides a global view of the analyzes carried out. The project area is highlighted, located within a possible green axis that leads from the city center to North Park; in this arter y, the Milano Centrale station represents the most important pole of which the dynamics of the ser vices were investigated. Inside the network of axes, the nodes take on the value of access doors that favor the development of flows towards the outside of the city to the countr yside. The nodes considered to be the most significant in the role of pole of attraction towards the outside were analyzed, the selection was made on the basis of the variety of urban mobility that come into contact and the quantity of ser vices present in the surrounding area. The project area is located near the Central station node, which in itself brings many ser vices but little connected to the site project under analysis.

Moving on to a smaller-scale project analysis (fig. 18), which identifies the neighborhood where the project area is located, the main public ser vices present were analyzed, intended both as mobility ser vices, such as bike sharing and car sharing stations. , both as public ser vices (schools, health facilities, sports facilities, offices and social associations).

Fig. 15 Territorial analysis maps - Municipality of Milan

Fig. 16 Main nodes analyzed and services

Fig. 17 Centrale train station node analysis

Fig. 18 Neighborhood analysis - services

3. Project Strategy The design strategy was born as a result of the analysis process which evolved from the territorial scale up to frame the specific urban area in which the former fish market is located. The Central node presents itself in the current state with a series of problems mainly related to the discontinuity of the existing routes, as highlighted in the first phase of analysis. To this aspect are added other issues potentially subject to improvement through a new intervention strategy: the distance of the services identified in the previous maps and the fragmented nature of the artistic and sporting initiatives.

The next step was to think in terms of connecting the project area with its surroundings. The research relating to the services present has highlighted the location of cultural and sporting attractions in the area.

The activities indicated have been considered as clues with respect to the possible functions that the market could host. The idea is to make the building a place that can be considered at the same time as the services already present and cancel the distances that separate it from the latter, creating around itself a new and proper “area of influence”.

On the basis of the already existing cycle paths, it was possible to observe that the privileged direction of the new axis could have been that which from the Indro Montanelli gardens (located on the circle of the ramparts, therefore referring to the urban center) reaches Parco Nord (peripheral green lung ). The hypothesis was to introduce a greenway along via Sammartini, which guarantees a continuous flow between the two “centers”, reconnecting the fragmented greenery located in the project context and guaranteeing the influx of users represented by students and a “emergency” category (fig.19).

Fig. 19 Project strategy schemes

Fig. 20 Overall project strategy - links with the project area and new paths with greenery

4. Project Layout Director of “GLUCK Street”: The intervention aims to mend itself in a system of relationships analyzed on an urban scale to compensate for the needs of the context on a local scale. From via Gluck there are some directions that “break through” the market entry and create continuity and permeability with the surroundings.

New volumes concept: Following guidelines and alignments, the new project volumes were hypothesized, conceived as basic modules to be transformed.

Alignments with the context: The intervention for the residences is generated as a result of a game of full and empty spaces and alignments of the site being analyzed with respect to the surrounding context.

The emergency residences are located on the front of via E.Lesa on the side of the market, in a situation of greater contact and social interaction. For the residences that develop on the tower for the elderly and students, more detached spaces are thought of as far away from the busiest part of the complex.

Decomposition of volumes by subtraction: The volumes were then broken down in order to create new passages and perspective points of view within the project area. Through an operation of cuts, the necessary emptying was defined.

Perspective views of the volumes:

Composition of volumes by addition: The additions to be applied to the project concept were designed in order to create the correct volumetric relationships with the urban context and the landscape.

Intended use of the spaces Final Volumes:

The rooms of the former market have been designed to host activities for which clues have been found in the surroundings such as art and street sports which, integrated by a series of public services, are put at the service of users of different ages. and social background. With the intention of restoring a building of architectural dignity and quality, the most recent additions were eliminated and it was decided to keep the existing shed on Via Zuretti.

MasterPlan Design:

Market’s basement floor plan: Reaching the site of the Ex Mercato del Pesce from via Gluck, a breakthrough of the market is expected, which also develops at the lower height of the same, to create a more intimate and compressed space used for exhibitions from the entrance up to extending over the entire lot . At the end of this axis there is a flight of steps leading back to the ground floor of the market and a final exhibition wall at the end of this axis which forks into an exit ramp on via Zuretti or the entrance to the gym used as a basketball sport, and

equipped with skateboard ramps. Near the entrance, it is also possible to access rooms designed as multimedia and projection rooms that may be used for completeness of the exhibition. Continuing from the multimedia rooms there is a volume of terraced auditorium with seats that develops at double height. From the latter it is possible to reach the adjacent library space also connected to the upper floor which leads to the “glass boxes” of a more or less private reading and coworking space.

Market’s ground floor plan: Starting from the original volume of the former market, the space was interpreted as a “co-living” in respect of the relationship with the surroundings and therefore considering a permeability of the ground floor of the building, seeing it as a great moment of sharing spaces . On the entrance floor, there is a perceived desire to eliminate visual wall barriers, making the complex more passable by opting for the elimination of the fence and the development of breakthroughs for the first 3 meters high of the former market. The main facade therefore proposes

as a double entrance wall and between the two develops the urban path that links the two external sides to the market. The latter are configured as “interstitial arms” of encounter and relationship returned to the residents and passers-by of the complex.

The façade on via E.Lesa is the result of an urban-scale gesture that brings via Gluck into the lot and from whose continuity lines are created that partition the interior of the whole complex. On the entrance level to the market, light glazed volumes are thus generated as studio spaces, and volumes built for a catering space and small commercial market establishments.

Market’s first floor plan: Abo v e t h e e n t r ance floor of the E x Fish M ark e t c o m p l e x there is an interme dia te fl o o r ( i e t h e roof of the audirto r ium) con ce i v e d a s a continuation of the indoor u rb an e n t r a n c e square and therefore follows i t s d e si g n . F u rther access to the uppe r fl o o r s i s f o r e se en near the entrance f r om v i a G l u c k , t h i s time as an extruded a nd cov er e d v o l u m e circum scribed by w alls tha t s ho w p a r t i c u l a r designs and geome tr ie s, t o di st i n g u i sh t he ascent block. T he uppe r fl o o r o f t h e m a r ket is alw ays thought of

a s a public spa c e a c c e ssible to a ll. th e r e is a c ooking wor kshop, a nd va r ious a r tis tic wor kshops tha t c a n be e xte nde d to th e te r r a c e tha t give s onto the r e siden c e s o n Via E.Le sa . Also on this te r r a c e th e r e a r e pe rgola s a nd outdoor e duc a tiona l g a r d e n s .

Fr om the te r r a c e the r e a r e a lso c onn e c tio n s tha t c onne c t dir e c tly to the a c c e ss g a lle r y f loor of the e me rge nc y r e side nc e in v ia Le sa .

5. Emergency-social residences The residences on Via Lesa, intended for an emergency user and designed for temporary use, were designed starting from the placement of a volume that recalled the buildings in line in the project area, with respect to which we wanted to maintain the front alignments. The building relates to the urban fabric by opening on the ground floor at Via Gluck, identified as an axis through which to give new permeability to the market. The breakthrough created by this operation establishes a first important relationship with the existing building, accessible in a transverse direction through the portal that is formed between the volumes.

The residences reach the height of the market 15 meters, spread over four floors; the first of them, at street level, offers social services accessible to all citizens, showing the maximum degree of permeability of the ground floor. The previously mentioned dialogue with the market becomes more explicit in correspondence with the second residential floor, where the development of walkways from the gallery allows you to reach the rooms on the first floor of the market, used as laboratories.

Types of accommodation: The residences recall the identity of the “railing” houses, a type of social housing that spread in northern Italy, particularly in the cities of Milan and Turin, starting from the early twentieth century. The gallery represents the qualifying element of this type of home; it can be thought

of as an extension of the living space, which developing beyond the door of the house takes on the character of a particular dimension of living, no longer private, but not yet comparable to the same category of “public” to which assign spaces such as urban squares. Perhaps we can resort to the classifications of “semi-public” or “semi-private” space, with reference to an environment in which the citizen, crossing the threshold of his most intimate dimension, can continue to live his daily life, sharing it with other people. Ultimately, the gallery becomes a place for socializing, a stage in which citizens participate “as actors and spectators in the theater of themselves and of the street” (G. De Carlo). In the project, the spaces common to all the housing units were organized in such a way as to ensure their maximum opening towards the balcony, extension of the internal environment.

The housing units have been developed through the composition of modules of 8m depth and 2.80m, 3.40m or 4.80m width, in order to ensure the maximum degree of flexibility of the residential space through their combination.

The development of each unit responds to a series of constant requirements: access via the balcony (direct or filtered from a common area), the orientation of services towards the North, the possibility of using common areas.

The logic with which the different modules were placed side by side was governed by the desire to obtain a shared environment between pairs of residences, a peculiarity that helps to classify the types that can be found inside the building. The units that benefit most from the common spaces are those of category B, with a shared environment at the head of the stairwell, and the types D, whose common space can vary in size and functions according to the different composition of the two residential units. In the center of the building, larger rooms have been developed, which house services designed for the collective use of all the residences.

Types of aparments:

Type A

Type B

Type C

Type D1

Cross section

Interior render view 1

Interior render view 2

6. Permanent residences The residential volume located on via Sammartini has a total of 14 floors, of which 12 are residential and two are public entrances (partially double-height). This residence is configured as a more permanent type than the residences on via E.Lesa, providing for the accommodation of the categories of students and seniors. The volume acts as a visual barrier to the square in front of the market, to create a perceptive entrance to the interstitial arm between the “tower” and the market and to capture the view coming from the south of the greenway from via Sammartini. The entrance therefore lends itself to being very permeable on the square. From here it is also possible to reach the roof of the adjacent gym designed as a continuation of the urban square. On the upper floors there are simplex and duplex apartments to accommodate from two to a maximum of four people, in a compositional alternation that works on double heights. All lodgings are provided with outgoing balconies of 1.5 meters deep.

Types of accommodation: The apartments of the tower residence are designed for medium-long term users, specifically the “duplex” units, which are developed on two levels up or down, are ideal for university students, given the proximity of the Bicocca University , and for young couples.

The “simplex” accommodations, on the other hand, which develop on each floor on the west side, are ideal not only for couples with children but also for the elderly, who represent one of the largest social classes in the neighborhood.

Simplex and duplex are organized in such a way as to have a “mirror” of the corridor on each floor with respect to the vertical distribution.

This is possible thanks to the use of a service staircase with three flights and the presence of duplex apartments which develop upwards on the south side, while downwards on the north side. All units are designed with open-space kitchen and living room, this allows for larger spaces and more easily adaptable to all user needs. The “duplexes” are distributed internally by linear stairs and differ in size in two-room apartments, with a double-height bedroom on the living room, and in three-room apartments with two adaptable bedrooms with a maximum total capacity of four people.

Typical floor plan - First duplex floor

Typical floor plan - Second duplex floor

Sections of the Duplex apartments

Interior render view 1

Interior render view 2

7. Project elevations and sections The elevations of the tower were designed with a functionalist language, which also reflects the typological characteristics of the interior accommodation on the outside. The balconies, which develop around the entire building, are “cut” in correspondence with the duplex units, in such a way as to create a rhythm in the elevation given by the combination of single and double height voids. This scan is also accentuated by the presence of shading panels with wooden slats, which cover single or double heights depending on whether they belong to a simplex or duplex unit. The external railings of the balconies are designed as a light metal

mesh, in order to return a cleaner elevation design, without the numerous management and cleaning problems that are encountered in crystal parapets. The same wooden elements that characterize the facade of the tower are used in the residential building in line, both in the façade on via Lesa, as sliding shading panels for the windows, and on the internal balcony facing the market, as fixed screens. on via Lesa is also characterized by a first level, occupied by the emergency services, which re-entering with respect to the outer edge of the residences above creates a sort of base of the building.

PART III. - Conclusions

gradual zooming process, to the scale of the individual architectural building.

General consideration Architecture is a continuous interconnection between theory and practice, between research and technical experimentation, between graphic design and the study of social problems. Thanks to the combination of the study paths that I have taken, I am aware of the close relationship that exists between art and technique: the two generative principles for good architectural design.

The search for widespread and shared quality of places of living is today the central point of reflections on the theme of living.

The German philosopher Martin Heidegger in the mid-twentieth century, questioning himself on this issue, argued that “living” is not limited to the mere act of occupying a home, nor to the common idea that we live in a house only because someone previously had built it. Heidegger must be recognized for having contributed to widening the meaning of “living”, which is not only tied to the restricted domestic environment, but also refers to all places of common life. “[...] The truck driver is at home on the highway, and yet this is not the place where he is staying; the worker is at home in the spinning mill, but does not have her home there; the engineer who runs the power plant is at home there, but he doesn’t live there. “ (Heidegger 1976). The goal of this research and design paper is to decline the theme of living in its widest and most modern sense, using a transcalar method of representation.

Starting from a scale as widespread as the urban one, the intent is to provide a vision of “living” that is gradually shrinking up to the inside of the domestic walls in which we all live. Then the project moves on, through a

Conclusions of the project The project presented aims to show the importance of the practice of architectural and urban redevelopment, showing how the intervention on the existing building can be addressed from a disciplinary and professional point of view in order to bring not only an advantage in terms of improvement of the single building but for the whole community of a district or a city as a whole.

Specifically, the renewal of the area of ​​the former fish market in Milan is part of a logic of improvement and redevelopment of the peripheral areas of the city. With this project, a connection is created between the central urban areas of Milan and the green areas that branch out from the city to the countryside, thus constituting a new connection between man and nature. Starting from the Milano Centrale station area and more generally from the city center, a series of green avenues propose to connect different urban nodes together, in this perspective the area of ​​the former fish market becomes a hub between the city and the peripheral urban areas.

The former fish market becomes a hub of attraction for the city population and benefits the entire community, as well as allowing the regeneration and improvement of the adjacent parts of the city. The existing market building is redeveloped and thus gets a new life as a cultural and multi-functional center available to citizens. Within it, various activities are grouped in order to incorporate different services and ensure greater participation of citizens. In the basement, an exhibition and museum hall is set up in order to expand people’s participation in the city’s cultural

activities, a civic library, which can attract students from the numerous universities and schools in the area and a sports space. On the ground floor a large space is dedicated to co-working spaces, to multifunctional activities, with rooms that can be rented for different purposes, and catering and rest areas to promote slow food and the typical and organic products of the region. All these spaces are organized around a central space used as a conference and theater room, useful for promoting citizens’ awareness of current issues and increasing participation in artistic, theatrical and musical activities. On the first floor, a series of educational workshops allow the city community to broaden its knowledge, guarantee support for the most fragile and needy segment of the population and therefore constitute a means of help and social support for the entire community.

The new residential buildings complement the urban area, improving the integration of the former fish market with the existing surrounding buildings. Specifically, the slat building is configured as a co-housing residence for the most fragile population groups, such as the unemployed, single mothers and homeless people. This building is part of a welfare and social support logic, aimed at improving the living conditions of people in difficulty and facilitating their integration into the city community, with residential units that can be rented for more or less temporary periods. The tower building, on the other hand, is configured as a permanent residential building, with residences for students and for people of all age groups.

As a whole, the project has the possibility of bringing a great improvement not only to the urban area including the former fish market, but to the entire city community of the district and more generally to the city of Milan.