The Casa del Balilla in Mantua (1932-1933): the limits of restrictive protection and possible new uses

Designed by C. Constantini, architect at the service of the Fascist government, the Casa del Balilla in Mantua was inspired by the forms of Rationalist architecture and bui/t using a variety of techniques. Small in scale as well as being a 'minor' architectural achievement, the building was used after the war to house first a middle then a secondary school, some of the spaces within being lost through conversion into c/assrooms; the restructuring work carried out in 1978 ìntroduced low-cost structural features and fittings. The City Council has now proposed that the building, empty for some years, shou/d be reused as a student hall of residence; so the preliminary sequence of on-site analyses has been carried out. Here the result of the unexplored issues that were proposed to the students of the restoration workshop: the structural and technological characteristics of the building; the history of its construction, modification and decay. The aim is to reflect upon the limits of protection in relation to the project for the structure's re-use, so that, while enjoying a new "lease of /ife", the building might preserve its characterizing spaces, volumes and surviving materia/s.