Cohousing as a model of sustainable rehabilitation and active preservation for small historical centers in ltaly.

With the view to the sustainable rehabilitation and active preservation, that considers Italian small historical villages not only as a cultural heritage, but also as a building resource suitable to be refurbished from the social-economic and technological point of view, the selection of a compatible and attractive housing model is crucial. Within the framework of a rethinking of the architectural make and of the search for strategies for an updated proposal of the housing dimension, whereas most of small settlements grow from self-building processes linked to local resources and strictly connected to economic activities, mainly represented by agriculture and livestock farming, cohousing model seems to be efficient for its adaptability to specific local situations. Cohousing overcomes traditional real estate development model which considers the “final client” as an undifferentiated user, excluded from design-building process and it proposes his direct participation to the design of future housing context according to patterns that are never rigidly preset. In response to the change of the residential settlement model and to the light of new life models and family organization, with the aim of redefining new types of housing, a methodological and operation approach has been defined, which allows the definition of morphological housing models and the evaluation of their compatibility, as well as need frame translated into technical requirements. The close relationship between type, technology and project is employed in the methodology as the key to not only offer performance of the existing building, but also the address of speech and the corresponding project actions, aimed at restoring the lost quality and also the definition of quality to be integrated in order to increase the performance levels to meet the needs of more aware users. The paper intends to present the results of a research applied tol case studies, exemplifying the typological model investigated.