Architettura minore del XX secolo, patrimonio risorsa

A definition that was used throughout the twentieth century, “minor architecture” would, in the first decades of that century, be applied to those structures and collections of buildings (primarily housing) that were recognised as providing the setting for monuments (that is, “major” architecture) and as expressing the character of a town. Research into typical features, techniques and layouts of such architecture reflected the existence of building traditions in solid equilibrium with the conditions applying in a particular place, and raised the issue of how these were to be protected. The extant examples of traditional architecture now form only a small part of a building fabric which in just a few decades has radically transformed our rural and urban landscapes – and which is the centre of focus in this volume. The issues to be discussed concern architecture that is not necessarily associated with big names and yet generates sizeable, though sometimes humble, building stocks: low-cost housing, the large estates or ensembles built in the post-war decades, infrastructures and buildings serving the manufacturing or service industries. By focusing upon the various meanings and nuances that the term “minor architecture” can take on when applied to twentieth-century buildings, one can explore and assess how identification and conservation are interrelated. The evaluation of existing circumstances, of changes in use and context, is connected with the still open question of the future that one can imagine for the architectural heritage left by the twentieth century – a future which starts with extensive consensus regarding the value of such architecture both as a witness to the past and as a present resource.