Enhancement of the identity of the Tiber River, seen in the three-dimensionality of a urban square
Today, the Tiber River is a huge urban void, low in relation to the city quota.
Our aim is to re-imagine the Lungotevere animated by a variety of activities, able to inspire a collective involvement in order to transform the site in the theatre of Rome daily life.
The (no-more only) retentive walls, released from their monumental rigidity, would be conceived as an adaptative structure, resilient both in absorbing the surrounding and generating aliveness.
Water is material and design element.
Local
Italy
Rome, Italy
Mainly urban
It refers to other types of transformations (soft investment)
No
No
As an individual in partnership with other persons
First name: Claudia Last name: Habib Gender: Female Age: 25 Please attach a copy of your national ID/residence card:
By ticking this box, I certify that the information regarding my age is factually correct. : Yes Nationality: Italy Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: viale di villa pamphili 139 Town: roma Postal code: 00152 Country: Italy Direct Tel:+39 348 516 8892 E-mail:claudia.habib@mail.polimi.it
The project is focused on the only straight part of river Tevere, of the same dimensions than
Circo Massimo, 500m x 100m; a space that is consider as square.
Nonetheless its historic value and its strategic location in Rome, it's presented as empty urban:
lower compared to the urban altitudine, at the moment it remains distant (far away) from the
social and cultural activities.
The project envisions this place as a center of social cultural exchanges and social relationship,
characteries from a moltitudine of use that are initiated from a collective participation.
The concept was born from the idea of working on the two perimeter walls and on the river
through human scale devices capable of being exploited over time according to the seasons and time of day. The two walls are not perceived as limits, but rather as adaptive structures capable of containing human activities. The approach towards the two banks is different: along the quay near the Rione Rule the wall that surrounds the river is ideally excavated and successively resin walls will be added, which are capable of being broken down and adapted for different uses; on the other side, along the bank near Rione Trastevere the wall remains intact, and it is made usable by the addition of mobile devices of different sizes.
On the same bank near Rione Trastevere the project also includes a floating device that can be interpreted as a public theatre/square, equipped with a foyer, a stage and of a background, and it is also characterized by a movable roof. This floating device moves along the bank by using the mechanical energy produced by a hydraulic turbine.
To complete the intervention, several terraces arranged along the longer sides of the "square" allow the public to observe the square from above.
urban center
river
floating
containing walls
belonging
The water as an essential element in “Piazza Tevere” project has led us to promote a collaboration with it, even in the event of high tide, when the docks are covered by the water.
The project is focused on the encounter between artifice and nature: it tries to bring citizens to the currently abandoned natural environment, by attracting the look towards the square, to its end were arranged projections that lead the citizen to look out on the square and enjoy the shows which take place inside.
Architectonical devices are located inside the square: it’s about partitionable and movable walls that can “open” as furniture which, thanks to their resin composition, support the rise of the river, or about floating and modular furniture. Made as floating empty blocks composed of recycled plastics that spread on the docks and remain available to users, who can collect them in groups or separate them, such as use them as a game, seat or equipment.
All devices on the docks do not require electricity, but they can be activated by humans in a kind of game: this allowed us to make the project more sustainable.
The device on the water called “floating theatre” is designed with low-cost materials and with a simple technology and easily achievable. It moves thanks to the river current, that operates a water mill arranged under the thread of water that channels energy and exploits it to raise the "floating theatre" along the quay.
The project, thanks to its low impact on the environment and to its strong adaptive capacity, would able to respond to society’s uses’ changes and to persist in time, always changing appearance and attracting more and more sustainable initiatives.
The strategy we used is focused on an ephemeral, temporary and totally reversible project. Its reversibility is precisely what we were requiring for this changing design. To evoke the ephemeral, the project aims to involve contemporary artistic expressions: visual arts, music, dance, cinema, theatre, photography, emerging expressions.
The goals of the proposal concern the enhancement of that part of Rome currently marginal compared to other places of the city, the consolidation of the image of Rome in the world as a city of art, and the promotion of cultural tourism.
It is planned not to involve major works of transformation, which would probably be ruined or rejected by the community, but it is proposed to imagine lightweight devices that fit into the place in anticipation of temporary and contemporary uses throughout the year.
The void of Piazza Tevere is then filled with magic, imagination, movement and music.
The reversibility of the devices allows the visitor to interact and transform the structures in a simple and fast way: an equipped wall can become a cinema by dropping a cloth, curtains can become a canopy, blocks can be arranged to accommodate an arrangement.
In Rome, public spaces, squares and streets are places of recreation and entertainment. In the same way, this Piazza, with the true intention of being a square, wants to propose itself to local organizations and all its users as a place full of activities.
The intention is to restore a space of extraordinary contemporaneity that is needed in the heart of the historic city of Rome. The Trastevere area and its soul lend themselves to collaborate with the new Piazza Tevere as a public space.
Participation is proposed as a project material for a place that is predominantly for living. This is manifested in the possibility to transform structures. Due to the high number of high schools, private and foreign academies, various exhibition galleries, museums and historic buildings, crafts, cinema, theatres and much more in the area, the project wants to make all these activities collaborate with the square, in order to achieve maximum inclusivity and a multitude of activities.
The walls and the mobile frames, as well as the floating devices, are suitable to accommodate endless activities, such as: market activity, typical of Roman culture; activities related to art and crafts, such as workshops or exhibitions; activities related to music, theatre or cinema, such as concerts, projections on the walls, theatre performances on the water.
All in favour of maximum involvement of the local community and visitors.
The Tiber for the Romans has been an important living element: it ensured the water for survival; it was a primary means of communication and an element of defence. The city itself is shaped by the morphology of the river. But today it represents an antagonistic place of the city, unable to attract activities and out of the city context: the two walls and the fast-moving car lanes that surround it, hinder its accessibility.
The intention is therefore to bring back to the Tiber that city life that animated him and made him active in the Roman city.
The project sees a strong involvement of the community within it, and therefore a strong sense of belonging to the place, capable of generating new local and expansive dynamics.
The benefits obtainable from the project would be the development of a strong sense of community, thanks to the strengthening of the sense of belonging to the place; a regeneration and redevelopment of this space and the triggering of new dynamics and connections also with external activities that can collaborate with local ones.
Due to the centrality of the area and its historical importance, the coexistence of local and European actors (in general, foreigners) has to be the opportunity to develop a strong sense of social inclusion and cohesion. "Piazza Tevere" is originally designed in the section of the Tiber between the Trastevere district and the Regola district of Rome, which are both residential, commercial and highly touristic. That’s why we think local stakeholders could be Roman citizens and who moved to Rome, wanting to fit into the everyday life and culture of the city. Crossing the area daily to go to work or for their leisure walks, they could enjoy a moment of leisure from the city and meditate in front of the thousand-year-old Tiber River. Similarly, national Europeans visiting Rome can have the opportunity to come into contact with the river. It represents the founding entity of the city that, in addition to refreshing in summer days, demands to be a place of interaction and conviviality.
The new “Piazza Tevere”, designed to be a place of exchange and meeting in the heart of the city, wants to be an active and proactive place for social cohesion: taking advantage of the walkway along the containing wall on the Trastevere side, everyone could show and spread their art and culture. Moreover, cultural, film and theatrical exchange meetings could take place along the quay side of the historic center, increasing dialogue and exchange.
The ability to analyze. In fact, the project has started from a vision closely connected to the place and its needs. Has been necessary to know how to recognize the potential of the place, from the social and cultural point of view, in order to design with extreme care of respect for the existing.
As part of the design, the project is the result of the ability to work at a very large urban scale (500m x 100m x 20m high) and with human scale interventions. This made us able to relate the huge area with everyone, in a game of constant spatial transformation. In fact, large-scale interventions activate the relationship with the city. We had to keep in consideration the relationship we wanted the city to maintain with the river and its water: navigability, the ecosystem and the physical aspect that makes it in constant variation, because of the seasonal changes in water flow. The human scale interventions goal is to narrow the gap between nature and humans, guarantying everyone’s activities and the community’s recreative and exhibition activities.
We want "Piazza Tevere”’s water floor to be lived by the stakeholders, and no longer perceived with detachment and distancing. So, we’ve designed the floating theatre and the systems of rising panels along the wall Trastevere, making them capable not only to withstand floods and shoals, but also to be the characteristic moment of the new square.
In fact, the solutions to promote the place have been developed by studying the potentialities of each existing elements of the state of fact.
Our aim is to re-imagine the Lungotevere animated by a variety of activities, able to inspire a collective involvement in order to transform the site in the theatre of Rome daily life.
That’s the key to design our vision: it is not just architecture to determinate the place’s characteristics and actions. In our project there are not super-objects designed for one specific action, there is not great architecture that imposes itself in the context.
The vision of that stretch of the Tiber River as a square is born to conceive it as an "open-air chamber", as a great social place capable of reintegrating society and nature, culture and tradition. In this way, because of being animated by the people who live in the city, it would become part of the urban heritage.
Therefore, from the predisposition of multiple conditions and uses, the stretch of the Tiber can become “Piazza Tevere”.
Another fundamental fact in the designing process was to choose not to see water as an element to be governed, closed or limited, but to welcome it as a natural element of magnificent beauty. In this way, the square changes during the seasons and floods of the river, supporting and adapting its livability, according to the height of the river level. In case the river dry up, we’ve studied (as an undesirable prospect, but a current one, regarding the climatic crisis) the way the river bottom could effectively become a playground and provide the archaeologic studies of the ruins usually hidden by the waters. It has also been studied the case of normal water level and slight rise where, by using rain boots and precautions, the possibility of walking or dancing on the lightly covered banks of water could become the event itself. And the last case of high water level, where the activities would move on the sidewalks at city quota, leaving to the river basin the role of communication and staging, observable by the projections designed overlooking the square.
Both the concept idea of a piece of river as a square, and the structure of the staging along the wall, and the different shapes of the excavation rooms, could be replicated along the Tiber river itself, as in other rivers of Europe, but along the urban areas, because protected by containment walls.
Each architectural devices used for panels and floats, such as the floating theatre, could be reproduced and adapted in contexts related to rivers, lakes and artificial pools. It is the very method of designing for “conditions of use” that implies, where you want to solicit and include the population, a diffusion for satellite elements or for entire proposition of situations.
The process of involvement, linked to the active participation of users, is still carried out by several architectural studies and projects for social purposes and redevelopment of degraded or abandoned areas.
The project of “Piazza Tevere” addresses the issues of well-being, related to the climate emergency: according to the current situation of the Lungotevere (lack of shading and services), the use of the river for the city of Rome, is unthinkable during and warmer seasons. Thus, denying citizens the use of the water resource that until a century ago saw an important influx of people rejoice in the days of rest.
The use of water for floating materials, and for reflection during scenic and artistic events, linked to the program of events related to environmental attention, want to bring people to pay more attention to a river that is central to the city and has significant importance for the ecosystem of the natural parks it crosses.
Another theme is about the social inclusion in favour of the sense of community in a place increasingly subject to gentrification: it focuses on social cohesion and the development of the sense of belonging, also thanks to collaborations of local social and cultural activities and centers that can build and gradually strengthen the network of relationships.
