Nature Museum in the area of the ex-Macelli

The 19th century system constitutes a strategical area both in urban planning terms, and regarding its intrinsic value as a historical document with its peculiar characteristics as a morphologically unitary and complete building structure. To design a Museum of Natural History implied three challenges. First: understanding the features of a modern Museum of Natural History, its scientific and social roles. Its task is not only to preserve, classify and exhibit specimens, but researching and illustrating the interrelations between natural phenomena derived from the transformations to the environment. Second: to adjust the objective of creating a modern Natural History Museum to that of valorising a place that has been historicised due to its formal elicitations as an instrument and opportunity for urban renewal. Third: to reuse and integrate the old structures without betraying their architectural features as a continuing theme of the expanding city.