How can an introverted industrial site become a place that actively supports the health of its users, its neighbourhood and the wider urban environment?

Developed as a competition proposal for the regeneration of a former corporate campus in northern Italy, the project approaches architecture as a form of preventive care. Instead of treating health simply as the absence of illness, the design considers physical, mental, social and environmental well-being as interconnected conditions. The result is a mixed-use innovation campus conceived as a healing environment: open, green, circular and adaptable.

Every tree here is carefully chosen for a reason.  280 new trees  absorb pollution, cool the air, and store carbon.


The existing complex had gradually developed into an isolated enclave of offices, laboratories and technical buildings. Large areas of sealed paving, limited vegetation and poor connections with the surrounding neighbourhood reinforced its inward-looking character. The regeneration strategy reverses this condition. Previously closed grounds become a publicly accessible landscape, while a combination of retained, transformed and newly constructed buildings creates a more diverse programme extending beyond conventional working hours.

The design is structured around three interconnected themes: air, material identity and care.

Designing with air
Located in a region facing severe air pollution, increasingly frequent heatwaves and the urban heat island effect, the project treats the local microclimate as a fundamental design material.

The arrangement of the building volumes channels prevailing winds through the site, while carefully selected trees help capture airborne pollutants. Shaded public spaces, permeable surfaces, water elements and vegetation reduce heat accumulation and improve outdoor comfort. Microclimate modelling informed the design throughout its development, indicating that the proposed interventions could reduce summer air temperatures by up to 1.5°C, mean radiant temperatures by up to 30°C and physiological equivalent temperatures by up to 10°C during the most critical hours.

ENVI-met microclimate simulation of the proposed masterplan. The map visualises outdoor thermal conditions across the site: green and blue zones indicate cooler, more comfortable areas, while yellow, orange and pink identify progressively warmer conditions. 

The new innovation building extends this environmental strategy into its architecture. Its multifunctional double façade combines a transparent inner envelope with an air-cleaning textile outer layer. Planted intermediate zones create outdoor workplaces and accommodate botanical filtration systems that use plants to improve indoor air quality. The façade simultaneously provides solar protection, reduces cooling demand and gives the building a light, changing identity.

A new centre for exchange
At the heart of the campus, a new Centre for Open Innovation and Competence is conceived as a floating timber volume above an open and transparent ground floor. The elevated structure preserves visual continuity across the site and allows public functions to extend into the surrounding landscape.

A bistro, auditorium, technology lab and welcome area activate the ground level, while the main innovation workspace is organised on a single floor to encourage exchange between teams. Workstations are combined with quiet areas, meeting rooms, informal collaboration zones and planted atria. A rooftop garden and public bar form a new destination overlooking the city.

The building’s timber structure uses large spatial trusses to minimise the number of columns below and maintain a flexible, accessible ground floor. Dry connections allow components to be disassembled and reused, while the open plan enables the building to accommodate different organisational models or entirely new functions in the future.

From private campus to shared landscape
The public landscape acts as the connective tissue of the proposal. Its central square is designed as a flexible collective arena that can host lectures, workshops, exhibitions and informal gatherings. A network of smaller gardens and seating areas supports outdoor working, exercise, relaxation and everyday encounters.

Public and semi-public functions—including food and beverage spaces, a library, well-being facilities, a broadcast hub and temporary accommodation—are distributed throughout the retained and transformed buildings. This programme brings activity to the campus at different times of day and creates opportunities for interaction between employees, visitors and local residents.

Soft mobility is prioritised through generous bicycle facilities, changing rooms and charging points for electric transport. Across the outdoor areas, 85% of the surfaces are designed to be permeable. Rainwater is collected through porous paving, planted areas, a water mirror and an impluvium in the central square, then stored for irrigation and other forms of reuse.

The existing site as a material mine
Rather than treating the existing complex as obsolete, the project considers it a repository of materials, memories and embodied carbon. Buildings that can support new uses are retained and upgraded, while structures that must be removed are carefully dismantled and treated as material mines.

Concrete, brick, glass, roof tiles, stone, staircases, sanitary fixtures and ceiling components are recovered for reuse within the project wherever possible. The original natural-stone façade of one building, for example, is reinterpreted as a “welcome carpet” within the new public landscape. Crushed bricks, tiles and demolition material give new floors and landscape elements a distinct colour and texture, preserving traces of the site’s previous life.

New additions prioritise bio-based and carbon-storing materials, including timber structures. Modular façades, removable interior partitions and documented material passports prepare the buildings for future transformation and component recovery. The project therefore understands circularity not only as the reuse of existing materials, but as the creation of an architecture capable of continuing to change.

The proposal transforms a closed working environment into a piece of city: a place where research, work, learning, food, landscape and public life overlap. By improving air quality, thermal comfort, biodiversity, social interaction and material circulation, the project demonstrates how the regeneration of one site can contribute to the recovery of a much larger urban body.