Bicocca
Bicocca is a historic Milan district with a focus on excellence, the location of prestigious cultural and scientific institutions like the Università degli Studi Milano-Bicocca, the Fondazione Pirelli, Pirelli HangarBicocca, TAM Teatro Arcimboldi, Gruppo 24 Ore, the CNR (National Council for Research), the Luchino Visconti Civic School of Cinema and Cineteca Milano MIC.
In recent years, the district has drawn Italian and international investors and a community of entrepreneurs, creative professionals and designers who are building the Milan of tomorrow.
A long story
of excellence
The Bicocca district developed at the beginning of the 20th century around the Pirelli factory, which gave rise to an ambitious industry-and-welfare project, building nearby schools, infrastructure, sports facilities and a residential complex for workers and eventually creating what would be called the “Manchester of Italy.”
In the mid-1980s, Milanese architect Vittorio Gregotti undertook Europe’s largest urban renewal project, with the aim of restoring the ex-industrial area to the city of Milan. Gregotti said: “simplicity is a very complicated thing to achieve.”
The Bicocca buildings - orderly, restrained, monumental - reflect his avant-garde vision of a polycentric city: a place that brings together various functions - offices, green spaces, cultural facilities and social gathering places - with superior architecture.
A contemporary
landmark
Today, Piuarch and Antonio Perazzi have taken up the torch passed on by Vittorio Gregotti with a new redevelopment and renewal project that aims to complete his work, taking Bicocca into the future.
All you need to do is this: try to make things happen, give different people different reasons to come to a space and make it become a place.
EZIO MANZINI, HONORARY PROFESSOR AT MILAN POLITECNICO
