The project area is located on the western outskirts of Bologna, in the industrial complex of the former Fonderie Sabiem next to the former Prati di Caprara barracks. The character of this portion of the city is determined by a number of old industrial facilities, some in a complete state of abandon. With the exception of several office buildings, the zone is perceived today as a lifeless place. It is in the immediate vicinity of the airport, near the expressway and several public parking lots not presently in use, since the area is deserted, but potentially very useful if activities of public interest are inserted in the buildings.
In 2013 Fondazione Golinelli decided to purchase part of the zone, an area of 9000 square meters containing an industrial building dating back to the 1960s, with the aim of renovating it and moving the foundation’s cultural and educational activities for people from 3 to 99 years of age into the new facility: the School of Ideas, Science in Practice, Educating to Educate, the Garden of Enterprise, Art Science and Knowledge, Science in the Piazza.
The goal of the project is clear: education on the scientific aspects of art and the artistic intuitions of science, bringing out the affinities of the two fields in a perspective of implementation of creative thinking. “What color is a Limit?” was the question raised, in order to try to understand how to think about the "threshold" as a system of transcendence. Architecture can mean the creation of borders, the drawing of a boundary: it has the characteristic of being able to host movement, to accentuate or erase differences. It can be rigid or elastic: the traces of life are gathered and dissolved on it; architecture permits microscopic interpretation of signs and, at the same time, comprehension of universal systems.
Opificio Golinelli is conceived as an urban metaphor in which all the activities take the form of ideal containers, icons of buildings in the urban fabric, like the City Hall, the School, the Daycare Center, the Construction Site, representing the ongoing work required by a city to live. Finally, the public space suitable to contain different activities, to sustain social interaction, where shared services and spaces are organized. A work of architecture with an intimate dimension, connected with study and work that take place inside ideal containers, with a relational approach, positioned in the space that connects the various activities.
This character of openness led to the design of a space with a local exterior, refurbishing an existing industrial building, and a global interior, interconnected with the world through open work modes, based on three generative principles intended to encourage and foster study and experimentation: the strategy of the unfinished, according to which the use of the entire area is not predetermined, permitting flexibility for temporary usage; the architectural paradox, which contrasts the vision of scientific study that permits enlargement of something infinitely small with a more conceptual vision, towards the sky, infinitely large; architectural synesthesia, making it possible to imagine space that can be ideal for study and research but also lend themselves to the display of art.
All this happens inside the existing industrial building, below the characteristic saw-tooth profile of the reticular roof structure, whose light underlines the public, open dimension of the internal space.
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Panning shot of the Opificio
Spaces on the ground floor are connected to a terrace, which is located above the lobby of the Opificio
Arena's space of Scuola delle Idee
The multifunctional space
The polycarbonate volume of Scienze in Pratica
The tale of the stair that connects common areas to the classrooms
Fondazione's offices volume is connected to the Scienze in Pratica's classrooms
The way that connects Giardino delle Imprese's spaces
Common areas underneath the cantilevered structure of Giardino delle Imprese
The glass volume where the Fondazione's offices are located
Bologna
Fondazione Golinelli
09/2015
4500 m2
Simone Gheduzzi, Nicola Rimondi, Gabriele Sorichetti
Francesco Abenante, Marco Bergamo, Marco Ciavatti, Irene Cogliano, Emanuele Dionigi, Alberto Zanelli
SAPABA SPA
Structural: Lanfranco Laghi. Mechanical: studio Zambonini. Electrical: studio Palerma. Cost accounting: studio BG. Environment and acustic: studio Airis. Safety: Giampaolo Fabbri
Giovanni Bortolani
Curriculum
diverserighestudio
Simone Gheduzzi, Nicola Rimondi and Gabriele Sorichetti
Bologna | 2003
The studio conducts multidisciplinary research, giving form to the encounter of types of knowledge and creating an ongoing dialogue between architectural theory and practice; composition is conceived as a dynamic relationship between theme and program, experiencing the relation with form and concentrating on aspects connected with the metaphor of composition, moving towards an ideal of quality that combines the environment with a positive vision of reality. The goal is the creation of a relational aesthetic. Empathetic.
They exposed their work at the Italian Pavillion at the London Festival of Architecture, at the Shanghai Expo and at the 12th International Architecture Exhibition of Venice Biennale. They presented their work in several lectures, both single and collective, in Italy and abroad.