A NEW IDENTITY OF THE URBAN COUNTRYSIDE. THE HOUSES AMONG THE OLIVE TREES IN PUGLIA (ITALY)

The architectural project has always had to do with history. It is known that any natural or artificial place on which work will be done has a past that we can only reconstruct with preliminary investigations to the project. For these reasons, the analysis of the set of relationships that the project establishes with the context presupposes a more than adequate knowledge of the natural and cultural environment in which the building is inserted, as it could be a harbinger of identity, patrimonial and tradition. Anyone who has lived in that place or who will live there should be listened to with respect. The nature that surrounds it must be listened to because, even before relating to the built environment, architecture relates to the natural environment that surrounds it. This is the case study of the neighborhood of artisan houses, of Fasano in Puglia (Italy), built in an urban area of completion on the edge of the urban center a few years before the pandemic where preliminary investigations have documented two important issues concerning the natural context and the culture of living of the citizens. The project born from the idea of Pierre Donadieu to give a new identity to the urban countryside has tried to relate with the agricultural value of the landscape of olive trees and with the resident citizens attracted by the single-family houses of the historic village called "case alla Fasanese", born in XVI century and continued, given their fortune, for additions of blocks until the XIX century.