Category: Events Archive

Politecnico di Milano
9 September, 2025 – 15:00

PhD Candidate Huilei Cao presents her ongoing research on transnational projects developed in relation to heritage sites. Internationally recognized architects are often mobilized as global brands and personified symbols of design excellence. However, their design ambitions are consistently reshaped through complex negotiations with institutional, economic, and cultural conditions, especially in projects situated in historic contexts. The research by Huilei explores how transnational architecture production in heritage-related urban projects is shaped by global ambitions and local strategies and actors. The findings suggest that transnational architecture evolves not as a simple circulation of global projects, but as a dynamic process in which global ambitions are anchored and transformed within diverse local urban strategies.

Introduction: Professor Davide Ponzini (Politecnico di Milano)

Discussants: 
Professor Kan LIU (Tongji University)
Professor Jiang WU (Tongji University)
Professor Minghao ZHOU (Tongji University)

Politecnico di Milano 
May 13, 2025 – 10:00

Speakers:

Johanna Lilius and Viola Schulman (Aalto University)
Markus Laine (Tampere University)
Salla Jokela and Mikko Kyrönviita (Tampere University)
Sampo Ruoppila and Jani Vuolteenaho (University of Helsinki)

The seminar will present part of an ongoing research project (funded by the Research Council of Finland) that investigates the outcomes of prevailing policy ideals of social inclusion in spatial development. These ideals encounter variations of increasingly financialized urban growth machines. The research project focuses on recently implemented, ongoing, and envisioned waterfront developments in six European cities: Helsinki, Tampere, and Turku (Finland); Stockholm; Copenhagen; and Brussels. Waterfront (re)developments are particularly interesting and contested terrains, as land values are high, the conversions are highly public in character, and ideals of inclusion are at play.

Discussants:
Carolina Pacchi (Politecnico di Milano)
Laura Pogliani (Politecnico di Milano)
Davide Ponzini (Politecnico di Milano)

The TUPACH seminar series explores the intersection of cultural heritage and urban development, focusing on how transnational projects engage with UNESCO sites in cities like Naples, Rome, and Venice. Drawing on a set of case studies, the series examines the roles of technical expertise, urban policies, and local communities in heritage preservation, transformation, and valorization. The challenges and frictions of such processes of urban transformation will be discussed.

Program

“Manufacturing heritage and authenticity in Naples’s Piazza Garibaldi. Histories, processes, potentials”

April 30, 2025, 17:30, Room 16.C 02 (Building 16.C)  
Capucine Tournilhac (Federico II University of Naples)

“Between global design aspirations and local heritage preservation. OMA’s intervention on the Fondaco dei Tedeschi in Venice”

May 05, 2025, 17:30, Room Z.1 D.I. (Building 11)  
Matteo Basso and Marco Antonio Minozzo Gabriel (IUAV University of Venice)

“Negotiating infrastructure and cultural heritage: A transnational urban project. The case of Municipio square and metro station in Naples”

May 07, 2025, 17:30, Room 16.C 02 (Building 16.C)  
Anita Martinelli (Politecnico di Milano) and Sveva Ventre (Federico II University of Naples)

Organized by

Davide Ponzini, Anita Martinelli, Paolo Scrivano, Zachary M. Jones