Prati Grows up

INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP “PRATI GROWS UP” Rome, 20-24 June 2011 – Faculty of Architecture, Piazza Borghese Scientific coordinators: Salvatore Dierna, Alessandra Battisti, Firouz Galdo, Fabrizio Tucci Modern need for climatic comfort and the implementation of technologies suitable for energy self production demands impose a wide perspective over the management of the existing building fabric, capable of facing the energy efficiency, environmental sustainability and bioclimatic comfort issues also on a social and economical medium/long period scale. The above consideration is capable of increasing the value of the efforts that collectivity invests not only in terms of expenses – in this regard it’s important to point out that currently energy consumption of these structures is high– but mostly as fundamental investments for a new action model aimed at managing an existing well established patrimony which is very large and complex at the same time. These investments take into account the binding demand for energy efficiency and valorisation of biophysical and bioclimatic aspects for the overall environmental sustainability of the system, as well as improvement in terms effectiveness of the operation and management of the above mentioned structures. In light of these considerations the workshop - open to a group of students form the Environmental Design Synthesis Studio in the Five Year School of Architecture EU, Environmental Design Studio in the School of Landscape Architecture, the Architecture Technology course at “Sapienza” University – University of Rome, Faculty of Architecture – intends to operate research and take actions in the XVII Rome Municipio territory, paying particular attention towards public buildings, spaces “in between” buildings, marginal areas and urban voids, with the objective of improving their bioclimatic performance in terms of summer heat loss and mitigating the ‘heat island’ and overheating phenomenon, thanks to a requalification project that applies passive cooling techniques, innovative materials and integrates vegetation. Ultimate objective of the workshop is defining a series of best practices and design solutions replicable and adaptable to other similar situations present on the XVII Rome Municipio territory. The workshop will be articulated in three phases: • the first phase will be characterized by a number of lectures given by instructors, public administration representatives and architects, which will lay out the motivations of the workshop and the project sites investigating their anthropic, biophysical and bioclimatic characteristics; • the second phase will be dedicated to site analysis activities such as site visits and interviews to local people operated by the students of the workshop; • the third and last phase will consist in the production of design solutions for the environmental-energetic requalification of the urban area around Viale Mazzini, form Piazza Monte Grappa to Piazza Mazzini.