Rethinking Happiness ENG

rethinking happiness Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

New realities for changing lifestyles.

Aldo Cibic

Rethinking Happiness Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

New realities for changing lifestyles.

We face a future in many cases full of uncertainties; at the same time, however, we are aware of the many problems in front of us: the list is long, but only to mention some we must tackle integration, personal safety, food safety, energy safety and sources, economy, waste safety, resources safety, suburb degrade and so on‌..

To fight our fears we need finding the way to proceed with a sort of sensible, creative and interesting planning that could produce ideas, proposals and answers able to guarantee an upgrading of life quality, for us as well as for our children and the people around us.

It is an idea of Happiness that we build by rolling up our sleeves, and which is generated by different people all sharing the intent of living together to create new communities. This idea translates into four new places, each narrated trough four hyperrealistic models, pictures and drawings.

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Manifesto The historical period in which we live faces us with conditions and challenges that could generate substantial changes in our way of thinking and a different, more contemporary approach to design activity. The economic crisis has revealed the limitations of a development model and, at the same time, the environmental emergency is forcing us to radically rethink our way of confronting the future.

On their own, these two problematic areas suffice to make us understand that many things will no longer be as they were before; but if we decide to try to do something, to get a glimpse of hope, we realize we are faced with an incredible opportunity to redesign life, to trigger a process of mutation.

We have to prepare ourselves to see with new eyes, to think about a tabula rasa situation in which to redefine needs, habits, activities, dreams in relation to new conditions of existence, to think about a more up-to-date idea of contemporary life.

The challenge arises on different levels: if we think about how we can produce meaning, we have to understand which references and which modes can be used to try to construct a path.

Where the references are concerned, even though the future may seem dark, because we cannot glimpse positive certainties, we do know about many things we can take into consideration, and we have access to great quantities of information; the constraints within which we can operate are known to us, and outline a reality that does not permit waste, that can no longer be based only on strictly individualistic, utilitarian logic, but has to take form through a model in which multiple parties work together.

This is because the individual disciplines, in the lack of general a priori visions, are no longer capable of providing responses on their own that can make us understand how, and under what conditions, we can implement transformations.

In this moment, the major perceived difficulty has to do with the courage to look toward ideal projects and the capacity to overcome obstacles often caused by unsuitable legislation, by political and economic vested interests, by the inertia of habit and cynicism that see change as a futile effort or even a threat.

By ideal projects, I mean a project approach that attempts to generate an improvement in the quality of life of people on the social, economic and environmental levels. The great frustration that can be sensed on many sides comes from the difficulty in understanding which actions we can be involved in to reactivate the sensation of being part of a process, in which we are doing what is best for the future of our communities.

Many of the themes, problematic issues and critical points on which we need to work are there before our eyes, every day.

Just to name a few, they range from problems connected with security (personal, nutritional, economic, energy) to themes of the landscape (greenery, nature, agriculture, but also urban and industrial peripheries), to the problem of refuse and, upstream, the issues of recycling and models of consumption, as well as the situations of emergency regarding young people and senior citizens.

There are also critical nodes that can be transformed into opportunities: one emblematic case, and an embarrassing one for Italy, has to do with our country’s relative inability to encourage tourism; in a country with such a wealth of unexplored potential, a great deal of work can be done to rethink

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models of development in a more up-to-date way.

Creative action in a multidisciplinary perspective consists in producing, with respect to the reality we can observe, ideas, reflections, proposals capable of outlining specific design processes to address multiple themes, to develop in-depth, detailed project briefs.

This way of working is more like the production of a film than the traditional professional approach of the world of architecture, urban planning and design, in the sense that there is not necessarily a client who commissions a project. Instead, there may be, for example, a group composed of economists, sociologists, architects, designers, urban planners, landscape designers and interested citizens, capable of proposing specific projects that address one or more theme areas at the same time, to produce the entire project cycle by considering both the more conventional aspects of the project, and the activation of social and economic dynamics. www.rethinkinghappiness.info

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The 4 projects

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New communities, new polarities.

A campus in the fields.

How a small center becomes a large center.

Venice agri-techno valley.

The Venetian lagoon offers amazing landscapes and incredible biodiversity.

An international corporation moves its headquarters to the industrial zone of a town in the Alpine foothills.

About one thousand persons are employed there, most of whom are young creative professionals from all over the world.

In an abandoned area in the town center, a new neighborhood is created where this alien community can find room to integrate and to become a resource for the territory

A young group that works on innovative start-ups connected with new technologies decides to utilize a large agricultural property surrounded by water, as a settlement where about 250 young people can live and work.

This leads to the possibility of developing a new campus model, in a situation of nutritional and energy self-sufficiency: agriculture, vegetable gardens, tourism and technology can thus coexist in the same environment.

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Superbazar.

Rural urbanism.

A place to live, meet, buy, sell, swap.

The city enters the countryside, the countryside enters the city.

On the outskirts of Milan, near the northern expressway, a new subway station is being built, intersecting with the metropolitan rail bypass.

This is an opportunity to invent a new public space that hosts functional activities of neighborhood life, like: daycare center, library, kitchen sharing, outdoor cinema, concert hall, work lounge, outdoor market, skate park, rent hotel.

Above the porticoes there is a complex of small housing units and low-cost work spaces designed for students and immigrants, who share a similar economic condition. This facility can take advantage of the wide range of services installed in this location.

One hour from Shanghai, a large rural territory with an ancient agricultural tradition is crushed between a growing industrial zone and a new city.

The idea is to create an agricultural park of 4 sq km inhabited by 8000 persons with low-density residential structures, preserving the agriculture and offering green spaces for the inhabitants.

The project calls for a group of elevated buildings on the streets, to create a perpendicular grid that floats over the countryside.

In the middle of this “agricultural central park� there are specialized farms that produce crops for the sustainable, profitable development of the countryside. The challenge is to create a new community with shared services, new activities and relationships, in tune with the territory.

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Credits Rethinking Happiness www.rethinkinghappiness.info

Texts by: Aldo Cibic

La Biennale di Venezia, 12° Mostra Internazionale di Architettura, curated by Kazuyo Sejima.

Exhibit graphics by: Elena Xausa

With the support of: Buderus spa, Corradi spa. Dainese, De Carlo Infissi spa, Gemmo spa, Gruppo Autogrill, Gruppo Rubner, Marazzi Group, Unicredit A project by Aldo Cibic, with: Chuck Felton, Tommaso Corà, Luigi Fumagalli, Susana Chae, Dario Freguia, Silvia Conz, Andrea Argentieri, Carolina Chini, Caterina Rosa, Daniela Ventura, Franca Bosia.

Coordination by: Tommaso Corà Book by: Corraini Videos by: Shado.tv Thanks to: Fratelli Bianchi, H-Farm, Shado.tv, Paola Coin.

Project contributors: Maya Brittain, Mariano Zanon.

Energy concept by “Cremonesi Consulenze”: Renato Cremonesi, Andrea Fornari, Stefano Zerbato, Stefano Chilese, Laura Cremonesi, Andrea Finezzo, Carlo Cremonesi Models by ”1a100”: Luca Stalla, Francesca Fezzi, Roberta Bacco, Mattia Bianchi, Martin Bickler, Alice Cillara, Isabella Falchi, Paolo Ceresato, Riccardo Rossi.

Contributors to the models making: Valeria Adani, Giovanni Corà, Francesco D’Onghia, Martina Facci, Ilenia Fossati, Alessandro Frigerio, Federica Gramegna, Melisa Indra, Michele Novello, Lucia Pongolini, Antonio Prinzo, Silvia Redaelli, Diana Rizzoli, Anna Maria Stefani, Lavinia Xausa.

Photos by: Matteo Cibic, Dario Freguia Drawings by: Chuck Felton

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