Sede Fascista dei Lavoratori dell'Industria - P. Lingeri, C. Cattaneo 1938-1943 by Matteo Pasini

SEDE UNIONE FASCISTA LAVORATORI D D'INDUSTRIA INDUSTRIA CATTANEO, LINGERI, TERZAGHI, MAGNAGHI 1938 - 1943

04 HISTORICAL BOOK

ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN STUDIO Chiara Baglione, Matteo Moscatelli Olenka Esther Palomino De la Mata, Gemma Lonardi, Ginvra Rossi

Teachers Collaborators

GROUP 09 Andrea Moi Matteo Pasini Ionut Popovici Andrea Zuberti

942699 942676 942745 942675

SEDE UNIONE FASCISTA LAVORATORI D D'INDUSTRIA INDUSTRIA CATTANEO, LINGERI, TERZAGHI, MAGNAGHI 1938 - 1943

«La sede dell'ULI manifesta un'eccezionale qualità urbana sia nel modo in cui si inserisce nell'isolato con un impianto ad 'H', sia nel vigore espressivo della facciata: una rigorosa ossatura di travi e pilastri, con i serramenti a filo esterno e a filo interno, in modo da creare un radicale contrasto plastico» »

PIERRE-ALAIN CROSET (Cesare Cattaneo 1912-1943: pensiero e segno nell'architettura)

III

INTRODUCTION

PUBLIC

SEDE DELL'UNIONE DELL UNIONE

ARCHITECTURES

FASCISTA DEI

DURING THE REGIME

LAVORATORI DELL'INDUSTRIA DELL INDUSTRIA

III.a HISTORY AND RELATIONSHIP WITH THE CLIENT III.b COMPETITIONS III.c FINAL PROJECT III.d RELATION WITH THE CONTEXT III.e CHARACTERISTIC OF THE BUILDING III.f PROCESSING

COMPARISON

BIBLIOGRAPHY

BETWEEN WORKS

I. INTRODUCTION

The last work realized is, in Como, the headquarters of the Unione dei Lavoratori dell'Industria (ULI, now ASL), designed together with Pietro Lingeri and Luigi Origoni and, for the first degree project, also with the collaboration of Augusto Magnaghi and Mario Delfino Terzaghi, who were architecture graduates. Located immediately behind the Casa del Fascio by Giuseppe Terragni, an icon of modernity in Como that the designers clearly mention in their perspective drawings, and arranged on axes parallel to it, the building enjoyed such an interesting circumstance that it could almost constitute, in a rationalistic key, a small piece of the new town centre designed by Cattaneo in his youth (1935). The building was intended for the management, legal and administrative offices of the Workers' Union and the various guilds, and was also to be equipped with a meeting room for 500 people, an employment office and a health insurance fund with medical assistance. Its completion, in 1943, coincided with the premature death of both Terragni and Cattaneo.

II. PUBLIC ARCHITECTURES DURING THE REGIME

The building activity that the Fascist regime carried out throughout Italy was enormous and involved various institutional actors: from the National Fascist Party to the Opera Nazionale Balilla (later merged into the Italian Youth of the Littorio), from the National Fascist Social Security Institute (INFPS) to the National Insurance Institute (INA), from the Ministry of Finance to the Post Office. As far as public buildings are concerned, the most impressive figure is that of the Case del Fascio: over 11,000 were built; several hundred were the Case del Balilla. We are faced with a real myth of "building", which expressed the determination to last and to win the challenge of time.

1. Vintage photo of Istituto Nazionale Fascista di Previdenza Sociale in Forlì. Realized by Cesare Valle, 1937 2. Palazzo I.N.F.P.S., Istituto Nazionale Fascista Previdenza Sociale in Mantua, 1939 3. Torrione INA in piazza della Vittoria, realized by Marcello Piacentini in Brescia, 1932 4. Cover "Costruzioni in cemento ed edilizia autarchica, Roma 1937

The political project of Fascism had architecture as one of its most important instruments. One of the categories most involved was precisely that of architects and town planners, thanks to the regime's building policy. The birth, in 1930, of the National Institute of Urban Planning established its leading role.

As we read under "Architecture" in the Dictionary of Politics published by the National Fascist Party in 1940, a work in four volumes strongly desired by Benito Mussolini, the "fascist civilization" preferred an "architecture of duration" and a "monumental function" of public buildings, because "in monumental architecture, which lasts through the centuries, is the symbol of the permanence of the State". A political pedagogical function capable of acting over time thanks to "the atmosphere that the monumental public buildings create around them"; an atmosphere that "gradually changes the character of the generations". Ciucci 2004

«Non Non passa giorno senza che il regime fascista si accresca di nuove opere.» opere. G. Di Giacomo 1942

The public space of fascism is to be understood not as a pure and simple background and stage where events are staged, but as an active principle, the very protagonist of the processes of building social identities. It's a space that educates, that regiments. Space, therefore, where both material and symbolic forces come into play. The new State Offices building in ForlĂŹ, built in the period 1934-38, was conceived as a soaring building that took on the value of a real urban signal, similar to the towers of the nearby Palazzo delle Poste, also designed by Cesare Bazzani a few years earlier (1931-32). Service bureaucracies and citizens had to meet in imposing spaces. In the plan of the ForlĂŹ headquarters of the National Fascist Social Security Institute, the "salon of the public" and the "salon of the unemployed" can be easily identified, each one facing the employees' counters, and the large archive for personal files and various social security practices. 3

To confirm this, there are two images of the social security building in Via Roma in Turin and the INA headquarters in Brescia, an example of architecture understood as "state art", to use the words of Piacentini himself, designer of the work. The reflection on the connections between space and power, stimulated by the new cultural history, has fostered the awareness that the totalitarian State expresses itself, legitimizes itself, transforming the urban landscape. Architecture, therefore, was one of the most important instruments of the political project of Fascism. Public buildings, in particular, were assigned a monumental function, within the framework of a system of domination composed of service bureaucracies and social clientele. The large windows, the large stained-glass windows, which characterised above all the Case del Fascio and the Case del Balilla, were intended to represent the image of the full integration of Fascism into social life. Ciucci 2004

III. SEDE DELL'UNIONE DELL UNIONE FASCISTA DEI LAVORATORI D'INDUSTRIA INDUSTRIA

5.Digitization of a propaganda cover "Confederazione nazionale dei sindacati fascisti dell'industria, 1932". Realize by Dirty Work 6. Cover of the monthly magazine "Costruire. Pagine di pensiero e di azione fascista", November 1936 edition 7. Digitization of a propaganda cover "Sanzioni. Acquistate prodotti italiani" on the autarkic laws in force. Realize by Dirty Work

«II reparti fondamentali del palazzo sono espressi anche all’esterno all esterno nei tre elementi principali della massa; due laterali, alti cinque piani ciascuno, cogli uffici dell dell’unione unione e cogli uffici delle Casse Mutue; e uno centrale cogli uffici di Segreteria generale e col salone per le assemblee'.[...] Attraverso questa disposizione l’edificio edificio realizza dei piani che rendono misurabile la prospettiva da piazza del Popolo e viceversa. viceversa.»

Novati, Pezzola, Catalogo Mostra 6

The last work in the series, in which Terragni did not participate at all, is the headquarters of the Fascist Union of Industrial Workers in Como, built on land near the Casa del Fascio between 1938 and 1943, and designed by Terragni's best student, Cattaneo, in collaboration with Lingeri, Augusti Magnaghi, L. Origoni and Mario Delfino Terzaghi. This orthogonal, trabeated construction, organized on an ABABABA Palladian grid in one direction and on a regular, but partially syncopated, modular grid in the other, is, in many ways, the most brilliant solution to the compositional and typological themes addressed by the rationalists of Como, so much so that it can even be argued that it represents one of the major sources of inspiration for the so called "autonomous architecture" produced during the last ten years by the Italian "Tendenza".

8. Sketches of the building. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 276)

10. Studio di un particolare per la versione finale della sede ULI di Como, 1938-1939. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 19)

9. Final design, plan of the mezzanine floor, elevations on Via Pessina and Via Bianchi, sections on the central body of the building. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 276)

11. The building site of the ULI headquarters photographed on October 17, 1940 with the vault of the hall under construction. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 21)

The building of the Workers' Union consists of two five storey slats separated by a courtyard, in which a two storey secondary block is suspended, including an entrance podium, a secretariat and an auditorium with 500 seats.

III.a HISTORY AND RELATIONSHIP WITH THE CLIENT

It is a rare occasion to see a project by Cattaneo realized, but unfortunately, the Sede dei Lavoratori Dell'Industria was strongly conditioned by the restrictions of the autarkic period, by a not easy public commissioning, by the vicissitudes of the competition and by the changes suffered over time (even those of Lingeri in 1960) that will alter, in part, solutions of great compositional validity. The Comacino group moves in the first degree competition from the motto "Sant'Elia 5", with clear references to previous design experiences: in the distribution problems of different spaces and functions Cattaneo had already tried its hand in a similar way in the Casa dell'Assistenza Fascista with the differentiation of volumes according to the different destinations. The autarkic restrictions of the time forced to abandon the "monolithic" construction solution and to rely on the solution of a structural cage in reinforced concrete 3x3 meters. Mariani Travi 2004

In the project report, the architects stated that the building responded to "a desire for clarity" that descended "from the geometric plastic unity, solidity, constructive honesty", in which the contents were strengthened and multiplied because they were associated with the "morality of man's essential needs". The critical fortune of the Como building, over time, had ups and downs. Naturally, the changes already underestimated during the construction, which will be almost contemporary to Cattaneo's death, should not be underestimated. Zevi, emphasizing the static nature of the scheme, recognizes in the work

ÂŤAlcuni Alcuni incastri felici, alcune dissonanze intelligenti, segni di unâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;inquietudine un inquietudine non placata, ma neppure gridata. gridata.Âť Bruno Zevi, (cit. in), Mariani Travi 2004

Silvia Danesi writes, on Lotus, that although the effect of the loggia obtained by emptying part of the median plane is interesting, it is not Cattaneo's most successful work. Kenneth Frampton observes:

ÂŤThis orthogonal, trabeated construction, organized on a regular modular grid, but partially syncopated in the other, is, in many ways, the most brilliant solution of the compositional and typological themes addressed by the rationalists of Como.Âť Como. Kenneth Frampton, (cit. in), Fiocchetto 1987, 110-117

13. Digitalisation of an advertising poster for the "Confederazione Fascista dei Lavoratori dell'Industria". Realized by Dirty Work 14. Digitalisation of an advertising poster for the "Confederazione Fascista dei Lavoratori dell'Industria". Realized by Dirty Work

III.b COMPETITIONS

15. Notice of competition, pp.1. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33) 16. Notice of competition, pp.3. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33) 17. Notice of competition, pp.8. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33) 18. Planimetry attached to the competition notice for the design of the ULI headquarters in Como, 1938. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33) 19, 20. Design by Oscar Ortelli presented at the competition for the design of the ULI headquarters in Como, 1938. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33) 21, 22. Design by Adolfo Dell'Acqua presented at the competition for the design of the ULI headquarters in Como, 1938. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33)

On 15 February 1938 a competition was held by the Fascist confederation of industrial workers in Rome for the design of the new headquarters of the provincial union of industrial workers in Como. Tullio Cianetti, an Italian trade unionist and politician, then President of the Confederation and signatory of the call, gave his support, during the same period, to the construction of the Roman confederal headquarters, which the Duce hoped would be built on the Via Imperiale, including it in the list of new buildings planned for the E42.

A few years after the promulgation, in 1934, of the law on corporations, the detailed report that Cianetti presented at the end of the same year, on 16 November 1938, on the activity promoted by the Confederation in its five years of life gives the measure of the important institutional role it had assumed. 17 Fiocchetto 1987, 110-117

The building, intended to house the employment offices and those of the various workers' associations, was to include, among other things, medical clinics for mutual societies and patronage, mutual assistance for workers is one of the actions most emphasized in the report presented in 1938 by Cianetti, and a general meeting room seating no less than 500 people. Few, but clear are provisions on volumetry,

the

ÂŤthe maximum height of the building outside will not exceed 17 metres, measured at the eaves and will include four floors", and on the formal aspects of the building which "will have a modern character with the finishing of the external elevations along the streets, possibly in natural stoneÂť. 21

Bando di concorso, p. 3, (cit. in), Baglione 2004, 274

The first project presented at the '38 competition bears the motto "Sant'Elia 5" and evokes the dynamics of the Casa del Fascio with the "snappy" layout of the elevations. The square plan condenses the functions on a smaller area than the one later used. The project report assigns a separate paragraph to the structures. It affirms the choice of an autarkic organism, where masonry partitions and monolithic stone pillars exclude the use of iron in vertical structures, reduced to a minimum even in horizontal structures with the laying of brick slabs. The "Sant'Elia" project, winner of the first degree competition, was configured in a high body, emptied in the headboard, approached to a low body with horizontal development, all on a square plan. The use of stone was recovered, as in the Casa dell'Assistenza, also in the "monolithic" pillars, in a cladding with regular ashlars in which the large windows marked a rhythm that corresponded to harmonious relationships.

SANTâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ELIA

Baglione 2004, 272-281

RODARI

In the project report of the competition it is stated that the need to avoid large closed courtyards, considered unhygienic and rational, or poorly lit in the morning or afternoon, recommended the shape of the H, i.e. two buildings side by side and connected to the centre by a normal one to the previous ones. This allows to have not only two shallow open courtyards, well ventilated and illuminated, but also the hallway in the middle of the two lateral bodies.

3 23, 24. Project "Sant'Elia 5" presented by Cattaneo, Lingeri, Origoni, Magnaghi and Terzaghi at the competition for the design of the ULI headquarters in Como and winner of the first prize, 1938. Planimetry and view. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 15)

The second-degree project, called "Rodari 3", instead, focuses on the concept of "symmetry of asymmetry" articulating the contents in three main elements and significantly modifying the meeting room.

25, 26. Project "Rodari 3" presented by Cattaneo, Lingeri, Origoni, Magnaghi and Terzaghi at the competition for the design of the ULI headquarters in Como, 1938. Planimetry and view. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 14)

Moreover, since the central connection remains the least visible and the least important, it has been possible to arrange in it all the services area, which remains the barycentre of all the offices, so that the economy has been added to the maximum comfort, having reduced the services to the minimum possible and vertically stacked. Baglione 2004, 272-281

III.c FINAL PROJECT

The final draft receives the favourable opinion of the Commission of the public adorned by the Municipality of Como on 18 January 1939, and releases the blocked scheme of the second version. The two lateral bodies, brought to five floors, one wider than the other, become asymmetrical. Their heads are blind, while the north-east and south-west fronts show the homogeneous design of the orthogonal grid of the floors and vertical uprights. These run flush with the elevation on the two fronts facing north-east, while they form a detached frame on those facing south-west, according to the solution experimented in the first project. The two lateral bodies are also emptied on the north-west and south-east fronts, in correspondence with the perpendicular grafting, on the first floor, of the volumes of the offices of the Union secretariat and the assembly hall. This solution re-elaborates, in the elevations of Via Pessina and Via Bianchi, the theme of the open strip of the first version of the project. Baglione 2004, 272-280

The central part is resolved with a low body limited to the first floor, accessible through a covered portico on the mezzanine floor, served by stairs, which in turn distributes to the upper floors and at the same time links the two opposite street fronts. The volumetric tripartition mentioned several times in the documents concerning the construction of the building, large, central and small body, wants to express first but not only a functional order. "The architecture of the building", concludes Cattaneo in a manuscript report,

«obbedisce ad un desiderio di chiarezza, lontana com’è com è da una ricerca di lussO particolarmente inopportuna, ma anche obbediente a quei requisiti di geometrica unità plastica, di solidità e onestà costruttiva, di distribuzione razionale, che sono tra i bisogni essenziali dell’uomo» dell uomo» 29

Cattaneo's manuscript report, (cit. in), Baglione 2004, 276

This final version, essentially, amalgamates the two proposals, explicitly recovering the formal matrix of the scheme for the Palazzo dei Congressi, which was rejected the previous year. Fiocchetto 1987, 110-117

The plan is exactly reported in the structural cage of reinforced concrete, with a 3x3m module. Kenneth Frampton notes:

«This orthogonal, trabeated construction, organized on a Palladian ABABABA grid in one direction and on a regular, but partially syncopated, modular grid in the other, is, in many ways, the most brilliant solution to the compositional and typological themes addressed by the Como rationalists». Kenneth Frampton, (cit. in), Fiocchetto 1987, 110-117

27, 28, 29. ULI, Scheme 3 "Definitive", Plans of the 3 final plans. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 141) 30, 31. Restitution of the complex consisting of the Casa del Fascio and the Unione dei Lavoratori dell'Industria. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 278) and (Brambilla 2009, 30)

32, 33. Final facades on via Pessina and via Bianchi. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 277)

III.d RELATIONSHIP WITH THE CONTEXT

In the mid-thirties of the twentieth century the area of Como behind the Duomo, beyond the railway line of the North, was radically changed compared to a few years before. In fact, the most representative building of the regime in Como, the Casa del Fascio (House of the Beam), was erected in the frieze of the great esplanade and soon became one of the symbolic buildings of the Italian and European architectural avant-garde, and which, from the very beginning and also in the eyes of the skeptics of Como, played a fundamental role in the symbolic geography of the city. In the decision of Fascism in Como to build the Casa del Fascio at that point, the intention to expand the "representative" area of the city is evident. In a short space, the maximum religious temple, the Cathedral of S. Maria Assunta, and the most important cultural building, the Teatro Sociale, are flanked by the headquarters of the single party, the true centre of political power. Brambilla 2009, 8-10

The only aspect that opposes the final realization of the project lies in the indeterminateness of the fabric of connection between all these elements: the space between the apses of the Cathedral, the portico of the Teatro Sociale and the Casa del Fascio remains an area devoid of physiognomy and charm, the obvious result of demolition even for the inexperienced eye. What is more, it is crossed by a dangerous fracture such as that formed by the tracks of the Ferrovie Nord.

34. Aerial view of Como with Casa del Fascio. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33)

36. The space between the Cathedral, the Teatro Sociale and the Casa del Fascio, in a photograph by Ico Parisi, 1935. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 9)

35. Panorama of the city of Como with the ULI headquarters. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 278)

37. Main front of the ULI headquarters on Via Pessina. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 281)

During the Thirties, therefore, people repeatedly thought about the possibility of redesigning that space in a unified way, as a large square worthy of the name, an ideal stage for the staging of the regime. It will never come to such a definition, and even the complex affair of the "decoration" of the faรงade of the Casa del Fascio, which should constitute the perspective backdrop of this large space, is a symptom of an underlying uncertainty about the generative rules of such a project. Brambilla 2009, 8-10

From time to time, in fact, the press also receive reports from readers who highlight how that "house" is still too anonymous and difficult to identify as the seat of fascism in Como. In a similar way, the design that Giuseppe Terragni developed for the "parvis" of the Casa del Fascio appears little more than a fallback solution that only in hindsight would be tempted to define as "minimalist".

38. Postcard from the mid-1950s. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 26)

40. Project area in 1938, behind the Casa del Fascio in Como. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 33)

Despite these uncertainties and this substantial inability to really connect the "new" representative centre to the ancient one, the area of Piazza dell'Impero, as it is renamed in the absence of a definition, continues to attract the attention of those who need spaces where to place the new representative buildings of the regime. Moreover, while the areas on the sides of the Casa del Fascio are being defined, with the creation of the "Luigi Negretti" Gymnasium and three residential buildings, all inspired by modern architecture, albeit in a particularly "moderate" interpretation, rather large areas remain available at the back of the Terragni building.

39. North-east facade on via S. Garovaglio. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 101)

Brambilla 2009, 8-10

41. Vintage photograph showing the ULI headquarters in relation with Casa del Fascio and the Duomo of Como, along via Pessina. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 281)

III.c CHARACTERISTIC OF THE BUILDING

From Luigi Cavadini's description in the publication "Architettura razionalista nel territorio comasco", the building is described as

«Formato da due corpi paralleli a cinque piani, di diversa profondità, ortogonali a via Pessina da una parte e a via dei Partigiani dall’altra; dall altra; i due corpi principali sono collegati mediante due altri corpi di diversa altezza, “sospesi sospesi” tra i due e tra loro indipendenti. Affacciati all’interno all interno su un cortile, questi due corpi sospesi sono arretrati rispetto ai due volumi maggiori. [...]

Gli spazi a porticato del piano terreno e degli altri piani, completano l’articolazione articolazione architettonica del complesso. I prospetti maggiori sono ritmati dal ripetersi di rettangoli (in parte finestrati, in parte pieni, in parte vuoti) che trovano nella libertà dei porticati del secondo piano una opportunità di modulazione delle superfici. Le facciate sono statiche, definite dallo schema ripetitivo normalizzato.». Luigi Cavadini (cit. in), Cavadini 2004

42, 43. Proofs of photographs taken on site on 19 May and 7 June 1940. Photo from (Baglione 2004, 279) 44. Vintage photos of the construction of one of the facades of the ULI headquarters. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 39)

45. Raised portico. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 41)

On August 28, 1939 the excavation work was started while Engineer Uslenghi began the detailed study of reinforced concrete structures mixed with bricks for the foundation works. But the work had to be immediately measured against the events of war and, therefore, against the difficulties of procurement of materials and the maximum restrictive measures adopted in the framework of the autarkic plans. The recovery after the winter suspension will encounter obvious difficulties: on 28 June 1940 the construction company feared the closure of the building site in the face of rising material prices and, in particular, the failure to deliver cement and iron. The problem of iron supplies is crucial.

The yard was immediately affected by the provisions of the Royal Decree of 7 September 1939, which prohibited the use of iron and reinforced concrete in all public and private buildings.

With the service order issued by the works management on September 26, 1939, iron is banned from the execution of all the pillars in the project. The structure of the building is in reinforced concrete but with limited use of iron and in obedience to self-sufficiency. The windows are large enough to obtain light and bright rooms, but the distribution of the buildings is designed according to a rational orientation and avoids an annoying excess of sunlight in the living rooms. The basic departments of the building are expressed on the outside in the three main elements: two lateral departments, each 5 floors high, with the offices of the Union and the offices of the Casse Mutue; and a central one, one floor high, above the portico, with the general secretariat offices and the assembly hall. At the entrance of the palace, which can be done through two short open staircases, there is a large and airy covered porch, raised about 2 meters above street level. Cavadini 2004

III.c PROCESSING

After World War II, in a radically changed cultural context, which in the meantime saw the disappearance of Cattaneo, the building was occupied by the offices of the reborn democratic trade union movement, like the adjoining Casa del Fascio, occupied by the parties. Even for the building in Via Pessina, however, the route is far from linear. In fact, the unions in the years following the break-up of the unit abandoned the prestigious headquarters, as a result of the unwillingness to purchase it as requested by the State. The building was then used as the headquarters of the INAM, a body for which it underwent a radical renovation less than twenty years after its construction. This is the only phase of the building's history to be documented in the archives of the Municipality of Como; in this case, too, the file is very detailed: it contains the drawings for the renovation, signed by Pietro Lingeri alone, dated June 20, 1960 and signed on October 9, 1961, and a brief report. Baglione 2004, 280 Brambilla 2009, 84-90

Far beyond the intentions of compositional and constructive synthesis that had animated the original project, the architect now intervenes to cunningly adapt the building to new distribution and functional needs: in addition to the two side elevations, a new body of the building, replica and addition, is leaning against the small body, sacrificing the balance between structural organism and formal arrangement pursued twenty years earlier.

46. Via Pessina. Photo by Isabella Sassi, february 2006. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 89)

50. Via dei Partigiani (ex Via Bianchi). Photo by Isabella Sassi, february 2006. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 87)

47. Via Pessina. Photo by Isabella Sassi, february 2006. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 91)

51. Coverage of the auditorium, photo by Paolo Brambilla, november 2005. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 107)

48. North-east facade, photographed from via Pessina, photo by Isabella Sassi, february 2006. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 95)

52. Photograph of part of the south-west facade, photo by Paolo Brambilla, november 2005. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 115)

49. North-east facade, photographed from via Garovaglio, photo by Isabella Sassi, february 2006. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 95)

53. Photograph of part of the north-east facade, photo by Paolo Brambilla, november 2005. Photo from (Brambilla 2009, 134)

The building permit is dated 17 October 1961; the construction company is "Innocenzi ing. Guido" of Bologna. With the intervention of the Sixties, the case of the headquarters of the Union of Industrial Workers of Como is definitively closed. Baglione 2004, 280 Brambilla 2009, 84-90

«L area a «L’area disposizione è di mq. 1950 circa ed è occupata dall’esistente dall esistente palazzo dei Sindacati per mq. 1080 più metri quadrati 270 per l’ampliamento ampliamento ammontano ad un totale di mq. 1350. […] [ ] L’accesso accesso principale è sulla via Pessina ed è arretrato in modo da ottenere un’ampia un ampia scala che porta al piano rialzato. [...] L’ingresso L ingresso carraio e di servizio al magazzino e autorimessa sarà disimpegnato da rampe. Il piano inclinato esistente sarà adibito a parcheggio per automoto e cicli, e la striscia lungo il confine dell’Intendenza dell Intendenza a giardino» Project report, (cit. in), Brambilla 2009, 85

IV. COMPARISON BETWEEN WORKS

«La maglia strutturale, fissata nel ritmo A-B-A, costruisce in maniera uniforme sia i blocchi uffici che il salone per le assemblee: [...] un’impostazione un impostazione simile a quella del progetto per il Secondo grado dell’EUR42. dell EUR42. Al reticolo strutturale della Casa del Fascio, si contrappone la ripetizione plurima dell’elemento dell elemento trave pilastro capace di generare un forte chiaroscuro di facciata. [...] Nella rinuncia alla rappresentazione delle parti funzionalmente più importanti, si può leggere ll’adesione adesione alle modalità espressive utilizzate nella linea “astrattista astrattista”,, a cui partecipa anche la Casa di Cernobbio». Novati, Pezzola, Catalogo Mostra

IV.a THREEDIMENSIONALITY ON THE FACADE

EDIFICIO DELLE POSTE, TELEGRAFI E TELEFONI ROMA (EUR), 1942 STUDIO BBPR

SEDE DELL’UNIONE FASCISTA DEI LAVORATORI DELL’INDUSTRIA COMO, 1943 CESARE CATTANEO, PIETRO LINGERI, LUIGI ORIGONI, MARIO TERZAGHI

IV.b THE IMPORTANCE OF THE EXOSKELETON

EDIFICIO PER ABITAZIONI E UFFICI IN VIA BROLETTO, MILANO, 1948 LUIGI FIGINI, GINO POLLINI

SEDE DELL’UNIONE FASCISTA DEI LAVORATORI DELL’INDUSTRIA COMO, 1943 CESARE CATTANEO, PIETRO LINGERI, LUIGI ORIGONI, MARIO TERZAGHI

IV.c EXPRESSIVE POTENTIAL OF THE STRUCTURAL FRAME

SEDE DEGLI UFFICI DELLA FINANZIARIA "LA CENTRALE" IN PIAZZETTA BOSSI, MILANO, 1958 PIETRO LINGERI

SEDE DELL’UNIONE FASCISTA DEI LAVORATORI DELL’INDUSTRIA COMO, 1943 CESARE CATTANEO, PIETRO LINGERI, LUIGI ORIGONI, MARIO TERZAGHI

IV.d MODULARITY IN THE STRUCTURAL GRID

PALAZZO DEI RICEVIMENTI E DEI CONGRESSI CONCORSO NAZIONALE (EUR) ROMA, 1938 GIUSEPPE TERRAGNI, PETRO LINGERI, CESARE CATTANEO

SEDE DELL’UNIONE FASCISTA DEI LAVORATORI DELL’INDUSTRIA COMO, 1943 CESARE CATTANEO, PIETRO LINGERI, LUIGI ORIGONI, MARIO TERZAGHI

V. BIBLIOGRAPHY Fiocchetto 1987 Rosanna Fiocchetto, Cesare Cattaneo 1912-43. La seconda generazione del razionalismo, Officina edizioni, Roma, 1987

Meuwissen 1987 Joost Meuwissen, Ornella Selvafolta, eds., Cesare Cattaneo 1912-1943: first monograph, Stichtin Wiederhall, Amsterdam, 1987

Mariani Travi 2004 Elisa Mariani Travi, Cesare Cattaneo. Fede razionalista, Testo & Immagine, Torino, 2004

Baglione 2004 Chiara Baglione, Elisabetta Susani (a cura di), Pietro Lingeri 1894-1968, Mondadori Electa, Milano, 2004 (Architetti moderni)

Ciucci 2004 Giorgio Ciucci, Giorgio Muratore (a cura di), Storia dell’architettura italiana. Il primo Novecento, Mondadori Electa, Milano, 2004 (Storia dell’architettura italiana)

Cavadini 2004 Luigi Cavadini, Architettura razionale nel territorio comasco, Provincia di Como Assessorato alla Cultura, Como, 2004

Brambilla 2009 Paolo Brambilla, Renato Conti, Corrado Tagliabue (a cura di), L’Unione Lavoratori dell’Industria a Como 1938-1966. Analisi di un edificio, Archivio Cattaneo, Como, 2009 (Quaderni dell’archivio Cattaneo, 5)