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Redeeming the shopping center. Victor Gruen’s ideal cellular metropolis and Louvain-la-Neuve
Titolo Rivista: TERRITORIO 
Autori/Curatori: Leonardo Zuccaro Marchi 
Anno di pubblicazione:  2021 Fascicolo: 96  Lingua: Inglese 
Numero pagine:  15 P. 159-173 Dimensione file:  1499 KB
DOI:  10.3280/TR2021-096015
Il DOI è il codice a barre della proprietà intellettuale: per saperne di più:  clicca qui   qui 


The ‘mall maker’ Victor Gruen is well known as the architect who played a dominant role in the design and global proliferation of the shopping mall. While many recent publications already highlighted and re-evaluated the architectural importance of Gruen’s shopping center, the urban ideal/utopian projects proposed by Gruen have not been considered in depth thus far. Gruen mixed his design principles for shopping centers with ecological interpretations, proposing the Cellular Metropolis as a new urban utopia. This paper aims to shed light on Gruen’s urban ideas, from his critical idea of the ecological-commercial realm to the study of radical commercial hybridizations, which are still relevant lessons for the design of our socio-spatial contemporary condition. In particular, the article focuses on the case study of Louvain-la-Neuve to ground such ideas into a real site.

Il ‘mall maker’ Victor Gruen è noto come architetto precursore nella progettazione e proliferazione globale del centro commerciale. Mentre molte pubblicazioni recenti hanno già messo in luce e rivalutato l’importanza architettonica del centro commerciale di Gruen, i progetti urbani ideali/utopici proposti da Gruen non sono stati ancora presi in seria considerazione. Infatti, Gruen coniugò i propri principi di progettazione per i centri commerciali con interpretazioni ecologiche, proponendo la metropoli cellulare come nuova utopia urbana. Questo articolo mira a far luce sulle principali idee urbane di Gruen, dalla sua idea critica ecologica-commerciale allo studio di ibridazioni commerciali radicali che sono ancora lezioni rilevanti per la progettazione della nostra condizione urbana contemporanea. In particolare, l’articolo si concentra sul caso di Louvain-la-Neuve, al fine di illustrare l’applicazione di queste idee in un sito reale.
Keywords: Victor Gruen; metropoli cellulare; Louvain-la- Neuve

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Leonardo Zuccaro Marchi, Il riscatto del centro commerciale. La metropoli cellulare ideale di Victor Gruen e Louvain-la-Neuve in "TERRITORIO" 96/2021, pp. 159-173, DOI:10.3280/TR2021-096015

   

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