L'eredità Caproni: un'architettura per l'industria del cielo e della terra in un piccolo borgo

In the architectures of the Caproni family in Vizzola Ticino (VA), the issues of architecture, restoration and urban history are deeply intertwined. If the hangars (1910) are clearly related to a theme of industrial heritage, the reshaping of the architectures of the ancient village, Vizzola, into a modern new town, a bonifica (reclamation) of a medieval character (1928) shows the research for a typological solutions suitable for the rural industry, faithful to the claimed 'returns to the earth' through vernacular architecture. The paper rereads the project history compared to that of the family and the context. While the stake holders are known, the actors and the project development are still to be understood. Afterward the attention flews to the current management of the asset. If the industrial architecture for the flight has followed a course of re-use and enhancement resulting in Volandia, Parco e Museo del volo, the so-called Bonifica Caproni is actually narrowed in the grip of more episodic circumstances, and also deprived of a shared protection program despite the many proposals. As a conclusion, a first issue concerns its management as the property is private but it also keeps a collective, therefore public, value. A further one lays in the effectiveness of the institutional protection because of the extension, which in the whole clearly exceeds the municipal domain and is characterized as much wider. The hypothesis is that a factual protection needs a territorial vision and that a strategy of cultural and slow tourism could be considered as a sustainable one for such an heritage.