REASSURING PLACEMAKING Daniela Petrillo – PhD candidate in Design Politecnico di Milano, Doctoral School of Design @ -
[email protected] Agnese Rebaglio – PhD, Assistant Professor Politecnico di Milano, Design Department @ -
[email protected] Abstract: This paper aims to stimulate a new cultural vision about “social safety”: as the lack of beauty is one of the most immediate ways of recognizing the difficult living, and experience is the most popular method of accessing beauty, the goal of this work is to “nurture people imagery” (Lambertini; 2013) through awareness, because pride in the place motivates collective actions to protect beautiful assets. According to the framework of “Design of Hospitable Cities” (Fassi, Giunta; 2009), the notion of “hospitable” merge in all of those process able to transform the city in a open, accessible and sustainable device and, together with the notion of “beauty”, they redefine the concept of wellbeing in the experience of public spaces. The multidisciplinary design research meets here the practice of placemaking. Both of these are characterized by a continuous process of redefinition because of their capability to interpret and solve the variable communities’ needs, above all in the condition of “difficult living” (Lavarra; 2007). Due to several research-action activities, this hardship was identified in San Siro and Gratosoglio, two council neighbourhoods in Milan. There will be here described the three – years - long research process where Humanities, as ethnography and environmental psychology, met the design discipline in order to operate a paradigm shift. From a “Defensible City” (Newman; 1971) to the wider concept of “Reassuring Scenario” in which a set of guidelines for institutions and local stakeholders enriches the existing programs of urban regeneration.