Le Petit Poucet is an architectural organism that cannot be framed because the design dynamics that generated it derive from adaptability, from the choices about the public space on the ground to the formal and compositive solutions for the building’s plans and facades, constituted by functional modules that compose an harmonic whole.
An overflowing space, from the industrial period, will be partially cleared to generate a great open plaza, the new propulsive core of aggregation dynamics. The changeable attitude and the adaptability of this public space are its main connotations: this place is meant to host different kind of activities, from the daily spontaneous use from large flows events. It also leaves a free axis along the secondary road that lead the gaze of a person entering in the site directly to the water. The vegetation theme, is combined with the one about the collection of rainwater in a proper tank, situated under the water square on the surface. This public place is extended to the ground floor of the building that arise in the leftover space, crossing it lengthwise: here the catering and cultural activities seam to withdraw to leave this wide telescopic passage free, giving the perception of a free, permeable ground floor strongly connected with the exterior. The building’s base is completed by other two levels that represent the real working and cultural incubator of the entire structure, accommodating functions like carpentry laboratories, a market, a relax zone and a gym. The horizontal dialectic of this building’s part diverge from from the one on top of it, originated from the simple volume of a parallelepiped that stands out with eight mainly residential levels. Starting from two housing sizes, one with three and one with four bedrooms, different modules have been developed both on one and two levels, composing the floorplans with a typological dynamism also reflected in the interiors.
The junction between the building’s base and the residential volume is represented by the vertical element that figures in the archetypical shape of a house: it hosts a greenhouse until the third floor and than becomes a cluster for the vertical connections up to the top of the building. The different levels are horizontally joined by suspended boardwalks that bring to the walkways from which is possible to accede to each house. On the opposite side each dwell has got a terrace; the winter gardens, that will allow people to introduce the green inside their houses and having advantages for the energy saving, are another identifying element that improve the quality of life in the building.
