Masterplan for the historical center of Viterbo

In 2016 the Municipality of Viterbo commissioned to the Sapienza department DiAP the drafting of a Masterplan for the historic center of Viterbo. The scientific director of the Masterplan, Orazio Carpenzano, together with his team (Raitano, Marcoaldi, Balducci, Bigiotti, Fiorelli, Montori) intervened using a consolidated methodology, based on a thirty year experience in historic centers planning, ideally started by Raffaele Panella with the plan for Città di Castello (Carpenzano, 1993). The first step was to involve a group of several local experts, establishing a scientific committee composed entirely of prominent figures rooted in the territory. The second contribution, which was decisive for consolidating the theoretical assumptions of this collective work, came from the local community through individual citizens and sector categories. Two different ways allowed a continuous interaction between strategic planning and DiAP’s purpose to design the city through architecture. The first method concerned the construction of an abacus of possible interventions on the historical center, applicable to buildings in a more or less invasive way in relation to the quality of the existing urban fabric. The second interaction strategy between Masterplan and architecture tried to verify the contents of the thematic plans, through an international architectural design workshop. In all the different design strategies, the new fits into the old without any formal or semantic ambiguity. Integration, if necessary, does not deny current temporality, but adapts itself to the needs and expectations of contemporary living.