Mercati alimentari dei primi del Novecento: dal Mercado de Abasto Proveedor di Buenos Aires ai Mercati Generali di Torino

Il progressivo accrescersi dei centri urbani determina a partire dalla seconda metà dell'Ottocento la realizzazione di nuovi edifici destinati ad ospitare le attività mercatali. Si tratta di architetture essenzialmente utilitarie, scarne di apparati decorativi, che lasciano trasparire gli aspetti tecnici e materici. Negli ultimi decenni, però, venute meno le finalità per le quali erano stati originariamente realizzati, tali manufatti sono stati sovente oggetto di interventi che ne hanno riproposto l'utilizzo attraverso trasformazioni non sempre rispettose dell'esistente. Nella convinzione che gli interventi di riuso dovrebbero invece costituire un mezzo attraverso il quale viene perseguita la conservazione di tale "testimonianza materiale avente valore di civiltà", la presente relazione intende fornire un contributo alla conoscenza dei mercati coperti in calcestruzzo armato realizzati negli anni trenta del Novecento in Italia, così come in Argentina, analizzando criticamente gli interventi di rifunzionalizzazione recentemente condotti

Sustainable Interventions for The Preservation of Earthen Heritage

Earth is one of the most common material used for the construction of historical villages, whose conservation ensures the transmission of a technological culture that represents the landscape, as well as historical and architectural values. The preservation of this rich, but very fragile, heritage requires the development of projects that should be promoters of sustainable interventions, not only able to guarantee a limit in the consumption of resources, but also the start-up of local development processes, generating externalities that could significantly contribute to the preservation of tangible and intangible assets. As it concerns Piedmont earthen vernacular architecture the development of thematic itineraries could give a significant contribution to the enhancement of this cultural heritage

EARTHEN ARCHITECTURES: HISTORY, TYPOLOGIES AND CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES

Earthen architectures are one of the best evidence of the human capacity to create built environments adopting locally available resources. Earth is a versatile material, used since ancient times for the construction of architectural artefacts independently or associated with other materials such as stone, wood, gypsum, lime, vegetable fibres. Although today, earthen constructions are widely perceived as “mud huts”, associated with an image of poverty and social and cultural marginalization, their significance and potential are known and recognised. The paper study the history of earthen construction focusing on the analysis of the typologies, construction techniques, and preservation issues

Preservation and promotion of the cultural heritage through University, public administration, and community engagement

[EN] Universities have long been asked to become promoters of actions aimed at increasing society's general level of well-being through interventions with cultural, social, and educational implications via technology transfer and knowledge sharing. Therefore, a mutual collaboration between different researchers of the Politecnico di Torino and local Public Administrations has been consolidated over the last few years in the context of educational and research activities on the conservation and enhancement of the cultural heritage, focusing on vernacular architecture.To provide a proactive contribution in proposing projects to preserve both the cultural heritage and social and economic development of the territories, a new educational methodology with a direct and mutual collaboration of teachers and students with local communities and policymakers was tested. Its primary purposes are to recognize local identities, identify resources and detractors, and define possible trajectories of sustainable development of case studies. Moreover, the projects propose their conservation and enhancement to improve the inhabitants' life quality and protect the local resources through technically and economically sustainable interventions paying specific attention to vernacular architecture's characters, local traditions, territory's peculiarities, potentialities, and critical issues.The results show the central role of establishing an open engagement of the local community and policymakers in complex and sustainable development projects implicating a mediator such as an architect. Hence, it is necessary to reinterpret the "symbolic" values identified by the territorial studies and to signify them (keying) into a restoration project able to frame how the local community identifies itself (framing) towards a model of a sustainable and compatible development project (modelling) for the future recovery of the sites.The case studies confirmed the pivotal role of the universities in educating the students through a multidisciplinary approach towards the complex systems of cultural heritage, engaging and moderating local community instances and the vision of the policymakers.  Mattone, M.; Frullo, N. (2022). Preservation and promotion of the cultural heritage through University, public administration, and community engagement. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. 639-646. https://doi.org/10.4995/HERITAGE2022.2022.1514563964

Interventi sul paesaggio. Il caso delle centrali idroelettriche di inizio Novecento in Italia

The first decades of the twentieth century are the protagonists of a rapid increase in interventions aimed at the energy structuring of the national territory. Identified the water as a useful resource for the production of electricity, works are carried out (such as dams, weirs, ducts, power stations) destined to irreversibly modify nature and the landscape. The paper intends to focus on the examination of some case studies such as the sequences of hydroelectric plants (1) on the banks of the Adda river, (2) in Val d’Ossola and (3) in Valtournenche. The paper will be focused not only on the moment of realization of the hydroelectric works and on the debate arising from their construction, but also on the initial deception characterising them: those interventions, which Ruskin would have abhorred because extremely impactful and that cleverly used the poetics of romanticism to convey their image, are now absorbed by the same landscapes they have modified, becoming themselves too the object of the protection advocated by Ruskin