THE “PARASITIC” ARCHITECTURE OF THE NEW CULTURAL HUB IN THE EX-SUGAR FACTORY OF RIETI. RESILIENT STRATEGIES, REGENERATION AND REFURBISHMENT OF INDUSTRIAL PRE-EXISTENCES

Abandoned industrial areas, places of memory par excellence, are "immersed in a temporal suspension that does not make them protagonists of urban life, and oscillate between the loss of values they have possessed in the past and the potential they can offer to the city". Differently placed in interstitial areas, in the face of uncontrolled urban growth, these today represent that condition of marginality capable of generating environmental and social degradation. The acknowledgment of the testimonial value of abandoned industrial heritages connected to the start of Italy's rapid industrialization process, as well as the subsequent phases, and the need for their conservation and protection transform their condition into that of a "possible marginality" which can be activated through regeneration strategies aimed at defining not only new forms of use of space but also renewed and more inclusive social models. This contribution intends to present, according to a multidisciplinary and multi-scale approach, the design experimentation on the ex Rieti Sugar Factory, a building with a strong identity value for the city, a symbol of the beginning of the industrial development of the area and a cornerstone of the evolution of the settlement tissue today. The urban regeneration project recovers the complex of historic buildings, creating new cultural and service polarities, and reconnects it with the context by outlining new relationships and renewed ties with the city.