nuovo campus IED Torino

RETHINKING REUSE:

MAKING THE ORDINARY EXTRAORDINARY

 IED – New Campus in Turin

The project by the architecture studio MARCANTE-TESTA, in collaboration with Arch. Camagna, involves the redevelopment of an office building occupied by a public entity in Turin, totaling approximately 3000 sqm, to house a new IED school campus.

The intervention is characterized by a complex re-functionalization in terms of systems, spatial organization, and compliance with current fire safety regulations, as well as a delicate architectural intervention capable of promptly responding to the specific needs of IED.

The designers made a clear sustainability choice in this project by minimizing any demolition, removal, and requalification work (unless strictly necessary), thereby reducing costs, consumption, and environmental impacts associated with waste disposal and production. All building components, from lighting fixtures to metal slatted ceilings and tile flooring, which were still functionally efficient, were preserved and integrated into the new project regardless of their intrinsic aesthetic value, often absent, transcending the idea of beauty as something exclusively new and current. The juxtaposition and coexistence of original formal solutions with ordinary elements give new value to places and spaces. This conservative choice leads to developing a new stratification of signs and meanings on the building envelope, which allowed, through a chromatic intervention with stereometric geometries and partial wall cuts, to radically alter the perception of spaces.

Classrooms, laboratories, and common areas present a new design interpretation through wall markings reinforced by details such as corner protectors and baseboards and enhanced by Giorgia Scioratto’s biomorphic graphic interventions. The project divides each environment into a “below” representative of contemporaneity and an “above” that remains unchanged, assuming a different meaning and new dignity.

This approach provides an operational response to the current need for highly significant yet more sustainable renovation interventions with optimized resources. Designers Andrea Marcante and Adelaide Testa, also in their roles at IED as coordinators of the Bachelor’s and Master’s degree programs in Interior Design, formulate this project as a manifesto to offer more sustainable opportunities for all interior projects: using minimal resources, avoiding demolition to contain waste production, maintaining existing materials, finishes, coverings, and even lighting, giving them an added value they never had before.

Photos by Andrea Guermani.