Material as storyteller. Hybrid ways between the local heritage and the global perspective

The debate around the loss of regional specificity as the consequence of globalization has accompanied the overcoming of modernity and gave birth to a new discussion around the relationship between places, history, products and identities. The design culture is questioning the theme by applying new models of production and design closer to the local dimension that can embody an enhancement strategy for territorial specificities, identified in the use of local resources and material cultures, like knowledge, symbols and techniques. In Setting up a dialogue between local identities and contemporary issues, design became a tool for transmitting material and immaterial heritage that, through the contamination and hybridization of methods, techniques and resources, can produce artifacts able to remember the past, the history of places and people, but even to narrate their own story, from their production to their use. In this scenario, Materials act as an interface telling several aspects related to territorial specificity in which is visible the value of signs as the result of the direct action of man and nature on the matter. The paper will show how it is possible to create, through design, innovative scenarios, by establishing new dialogues: between two ways of production currently considered distinct: the standardized one of globalization and the withdrawn one of the local districts; and between user and products through new forms of interaction between materials and environment, production process, and way of use.