Innocence - editorial San Rocco 0

San Rocco is a magazine about architecture. San Rocco does not solve problems. It is not a useful magazine. San Rocco is neither serious nor friendly. San Rocco is written by architects. As such, San Rocco is neither par- ticularly intelligent nor philologically accurate. San Rocco is serious. It takes the risk of appearing naive. San Rocco will not last forever. There will be no more than 20 San Roccos over the course of the magazine’s ve-year plan. San Rocco is the name of a place in Monza that is not a nice one. In 1971, Giorgio Grassi and Aldo Rossi engaged in a design competition for San Rocco. In the end, the project they designed was not built; ordinary housing blocks were built instead. A few negligible drawings of the San Rocco project have survived in old monographs, along with a black-and-white photograph of the competition model. It is a picture taken from above of the white plaster model. Close to the buildings there is a large label that reads “MONZA SAN ROCCO scala 1:500” and whose lettering is in such high relief that it casts dramatic shadows.