On the invitation of the local authorities, the students at Domus Academy have taken the opportunity to transform the city into a design laboratory. The directors of the two Masters courses in Urban Vision and Architectural Design and in Interior and Living Design Gianandrea Barreca and Antonella Dedini, and Paolo Debiaggi, the local government architect responsible for the promotion and development of Novara, tell Domus about the results of this intriguing collaboration.

Domus: Working with local government is of course an interesting opportunity for a school - but it brings risks with it as well. What were your aims for the project and what was your approach?
Gianandrea Barreca: It's right that a school should offer its products, whether in terms of interior design, architecture or city planning, to anyone asking for them: the greatest benefit this brings the school is in allowing the students to experiment with real life situations. But it's also true that, once the work is finished, a school must be reasonably wary that its contribution doesn't peter out in a series of interesting ideas and images, but is in some way followed up. It's also important that it doesn't become simply an opportunity to smuggle in mediocre city planning under cover of involvement in a cultural programme. But I think you can say, given the commitment and the interest shown by the local government, this won't be what happens in this case. A project of this type cannot be allowed to become an opportunity for the local government to smuggle in even low profile political activity or city planning under cover of involvement in a cultural programme. The Ordine degli Architetti di Novara, which was invited to join, and was partly involved in the project, closed the opening conference by saying that they would like to set up a panel with us and with the local government for the management of the area's future. This would involve sharing ideas, inclusions in the curriculum and competitions open to schools. At the moment, however, we've not yet had specific details on this.

Antonella Dedini: We're interested in working "by doing" - our aim is always to work with a real client. Of course there are many firms that come here and take ideas, but that's something you come to expect.

Paolo Debiaggi: The award of Expo 2015 to Milan offers significant opportunities for development, and for Novara as well. We can realise these if we create a local design scheme that utilises the possibilities created by the event to their full potential. Novara's local government has so far shown to be willing and active in putting itself forward as a possible partner for the Expo. The setting-up of a Novara Expo committee, the signing of a draft agreement with Milan in September 2008, and, in October 2008, the organisation of the first Expo-branded event, are all important steps as we get closer to the event itself. The research and design seminar organised within the Masters in Urban Management and Architectural Design run by Domus Academy set itself the objective of identifying a development strategy - defining an innovative, flexible system allowing the city to welcome visitors and, more generally, implement ideas for extending housing in Novara. The central idea of the seminar was to bring together ideas on how the main areas to be converted in our city, disused areas or urban structures on the verge of being dismantled, could be brought back into use in preparation for the Expo. Involving an international group of young professionals at a leading specialised training school, the seminar aimed to provide the city with a design scheme to promote Novara in preparation for the Expo, and also bring together interesting ideas for its future development.

Domus: You put together a design team covering areas from city planning to seating. Were you successful when it came to all of these?
GB: An important idea is complexity of level. My Masters course focuses on all the levels within a design and in particular on the difficult and complex transitions and relations between these. "Architectural Link", an idea that I inherited from Andrea Branzi, is what we call the ability to hold together all these different levels. This implies to the conceptual as well as the graphic at all levels of the project and design. One of the biggest problems today is the lack of a connection between objects and the rest of the city. Working with the Masters in interior design means that you complete this transition and go inside the building.
AD: One of the Academy's greatest strengths is its ability to establish connections between the different disciplines of the Masters programmes and make the students work together. The Masters in Urban and Architectural Design, in particular, helps me the most in getting outside the idea of living in a place. For me, living somewhere is living in a city. This allows you to plan the urban dynamics, down to deciding what to do with the interior of an old barracks or an old hospital: you need to find a strong concept for the end use and then define all the functions of the interior in terms of it. In this case, 70% of the work was partly in imagining how these areas could be used and how they could benefit Novara in terms of the Expo, but above in deciding all how they could be used after the Expo.

Domus: What happens after the Expo is one of the issues that has been most discussed; it is often disregarded, and this has affected recent events of this type. Does a concern with this run through your designs?
GB: Novara is really only a spectator at the Expo, though a really attentive one. The city's aim is to siphon off a little of the wealth that the Expo will produce to bring about processes of transformation in the areas we've focused on. An implicit aim of the seminar's work was to come up with designs that could interact and be developed in different ways and at different levels during all three phases of the Expo - before, during and after.

Domus: The objectives of the Masters degrees include "research into innovative building forms and new types of housing". What does this involve?
AD: To give you an example, among the projects we have developed, there was the conversion of a former social centre. This was a building from towards the end of the 1950s, completely abandoned and of no particular architecture importance, which is now a homeless refuge. We produced a design to refurbish and re-equip it to create a place in the centre of Novara offering shelter and a range of services - spaces to relax, have something to eat and meet other people. We designed services to be distributed through Navara to bring people into the new social centre - for example, mobile libraries and bike sharing schemes. The interior of the building was demolished, but the facade was preserved like a huge theatre backdrop. The idea was to fit out the interior using adaptable prefabricated inserts. These were made from inexpensive materials to create dynamic spaces for the temporary, mobile services that the local government wanted to provide. The space outside was redesigned and converted and then given over to the city.

Domus: This is a place where people from different social classes can mix?
AD: The idea was to bring together the different cultures that you find in this kind of marginalised, run-down area. Dynamic, active young people and students can help the centre itself and the homeless, and in return they get board and lodging. In other words, it's not a ghetto, but a place where people from different backgrounds can mix.
GB: I'm particularly interested in that huge and heterogeneous block of people bounded by the two extreme income bands. They have needs and expectations in terms of housing which are highly diverse and in continual change and transformation. The Expo is also an opportunity to think about this and to try to understand how historic areas and disused sites of minimal architectural value can be used to transform Novara into a laboratory providing new and experimental housing solutions. In the work presented at the end of the seminar, we identified a wide-ranging collection of designs and solutions that could be applied to a large variety of areas: these include the disused railway area, an abandoned workers' village and an old hospital. In a way too that's slightly provocative, we've designed a model that can transferred to other cities.

Domus: Taking the high speed village as an example, what is the most appropriate level for the design for this area of the city: global, local or regional?
GB: I asked the students to use the areas made available by the local government as laboratory samples and think about the levels of the project in the widest sense and about the relations between them. Global, regional and local don't in themselves mean anything, but in effect they synthesise and contain three different ways of viewing, analysing and redesigning an area. They are the categories of the mind which form the starting-point for our ideas, the distance we view an area from, the physical dimension that the design is rooted in, and the sources or archive where you search for the fundamentals and the rationale of the design. In my opinion, finding a thread that links these three - or more - different dimensions means that you flesh out a design and provide a response to your interlocutor or client. Some projects view an area from a regional angle and bring together information on the possibilities available within a global environment, bringing this to bear on local needs. In contrast, others continue to work solely at the extremes, on the relationships between global and local, or only with the points of contact and overlap between the three "dimensions". It's like there's a comprehensive table of the ways you can put things together to determine the basis for the best possible design. Between the lines of the transport and infrastructure links between Milan and Novara, there are strips 50, 80 and 100 metres wide that can't be built on or cultivated. The idea was to give these places an identity as an "extended city". Another design, for example, involves the transformation of the high speed village into a biotechnology and agriculture research centre, specifically for rice, in combination with a large agricultural park. During the Expo, this area could become a place to visit, a centre of excellence, an area detached from the Expo, or an "outdoors reception room" to give you an insight into another side of life. After the Expo, it could return to being somewhere for the city of Novara, a centre of excellence, but also somewhere to spend your free time. Other projects have solely concerned themselves with areas of completed buildings, working exclusively on ideas of the different possibilities available and on phases of implementation and transformation in connection with the Expo.

Domus: Another project is the conversion of the old hospital…
AD: We decided that once the building was clear of additions, we would flood the area with water to create a large ricefield which would reflect Antonelli's architecture. The students interpreted the local concerns really well. There's the risk of over-preserving historic centres, keeping the buildings but creating holes in the budget. The rice museum could be created inside Antonelli's buildings. But this would work only if the city developed high-profile research in parallel - so that it is not only representative but also a development. Novara has an unquestionable economic resource in rice. Together with high profile research into this, you could keep the museum inside the historic centre, enhancing its value and providing some background.
GB: The issue is not only the scale of the design, but also the scale of the programme. There's humus here and the possibility of designing a research centre. We managed to give a very inward-looking vision a broader scale and combine it with a vision that references light, mirroring and quality, and is more strategic.

PD: "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life" is the theme of the event that will bring millions of visitors into the Milan area. The availability of primary resources for food is beginning to look like it will be the dominant theme as a result. The Novara area, with its tradition of rice-growing and its excellence in the field of food of wine, could provide examples of outstanding interest. The influx of visitors, particularly in the year of the event itself, must be met with an adequate reception system. It's not just the city of Milan but also the surrounding areas that must get ready to meet this challenge. Novara meets all the conditions to be able to take an active role in this reception system for the event, since it is one of the urban areas most quickly and easily reachable from the site planned for Expo 2015, located behind the new Rho-Pero trade fair area. Domus: What's the next step?
AD: The mayor has been very interested in the choices we've made. He liked the approach and the dynamics and has suggested bringing out a publication. We are also waiting for the panel suggested by the Ordine degli Architetti.

Domus: Is it likely that you will be able to realise the designs?
GB: I think that things are happening and that some businesses in Milan may be interested in developing some of the projects. I would be very happy if the local government brings out a publication, but especially if the Ordine sets up a panel, since it would be an important signal. The Ordine would be not only an observer, but an integral part from the outset and a serious mover in the proposals. The school could become a player in this with the Ordine and the local government. I think that the situation in Novara and the willingness of the mayor and his administration will allow this to happen. PD: Thanks to the enthusiastic work of the students and the invaluable coordination provided by their project leaders and tutors, the seminar has produced a range of very interesting ideas and suggestions. As an exercise carried out over an extremely restricted period of time, it shouldn't be seen as an immediately feasible, concrete solution to the complex problems of urban transformation. The objective, which was achieved, was rather to open a local debate with the invaluable help of an external perspective on our city, one coming from a different culture, in terms of the potential for growth offered by the main opportunities for developing our city, and for making it an attractive and welcoming place. The ideas and proposals that have been put forward and elaborated should now be disseminated, allowed to settle, discussed and further developed, in the hope that they will interest entrepreneurs who might want to put them into practice. For its part, the local government, through my department, and in collaboration with the associations that are jointly responsible for strategy, will proceed with further initiatives to support the promotion and development of the city. In this regard, I imagine that there will be additional opportunities for collaboration with Domus Academy, both in terms of extending the design ideas developed by the seminar, which will be greeted with more local interest, and in opening up new areas of research and design.