Pescomaggiore is a small town located in the mountains 20 km from l'Aquila, that was heavily damaged by the last earthquake.
Most of its 45 inhabitants are old people living traditionally from agriculture, sheep and goat raising, as in many other places in Italy, especially in the Abruzzo region.
Since april 2009, almost all them are living in the tent camps surrounding l'Aquila.
A few months after the disaster, the Civil Protection Office, in charge of emergency operations...
more »Pescomaggiore is a small town located in the mountains 20 km from l'Aquila, that was heavily damaged by the last earthquake.
Most of its 45 inhabitants are old people living traditionally from agriculture, sheep and goat raising, as in many other places in Italy, especially in the Abruzzo region.
Since april 2009, almost all them are living in the tent camps surrounding l'Aquila.
A few months after the disaster, the Civil Protection Office, in charge of emergency operations and reconstruction, made indvidual proposals to each one of the inhabitants.
The proposition was not to secure and reconstruct their houses, as they expected and wanted, since they lived all their life there, and still had most of the economic activities with which they make their living, but instead to build new ones, in different and separated places in the plains below the small town, approximately 10-15 km from Pescomaggiore,and only for a small fraction of the families.
Understanding that this proposition would quickly transform Pescomaggiore in a ghost town, a small group of young people, among which there are two architects, who had been living there before the earthquake, started to think about what goes now under the name of the "Renaissance Project" (Progetto Rinascita) together with the local elder people.
They made a project of building new houses, in Pescomaggiore, combining two modern concepts in social architecture: eco-housing and self-construction. Self-construction made possible by the architects simplified project, offers the possibility to reduce the final costs for the future inhabitants (making it possible for them to have a 45 square meters house for a fraction of the market price).
Last but not least, self-construction makes them able to participate with their work to the project, giving them a feeling of a common goal, forgetting about the earthquake and thinking about the future with still many fears but a renewed hope.
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