Open spaces, Walls and Housing. The Aesthetics and Politics of Social Order (original) (raw)

Whether public spaces play a role as catalysts for change in the sake of the common good this is very much depending on the quality of governance and society. In Italy, deep changes are affecting the design and use of open spaces in new housing developments within the central core of the city. Our contribution focuses on the city of Milan. In a phase of re-urbanization and of so called "urban renaissance", the physical and symbolic features of the new open spaces being produced under the pressure of the real estate market are expressing new conditions and forms of social and spatial re-organization which seem to correspond to the expectations of suburban dreams within the city. Field research reveals that more and more, the design of urban transformation is using open space to organize separation and our interpretation is that the spatial character of urban change in Milan is endangering some fundamentals which made the European city renown as a place of emancipation and d...