Santa & Cole, Ediciones de diseño S.A.

Santa & Cole's project, the immediate objective of which is to express Barcelona's concept of socialization of the urban space, was presented last July in the framework of the important activities organized by Turin to celebrate its election as "world design capital" by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design.

The idea of Santa & Cole and the team of BB+GG arquitectes, led by Beth Galí and Jaume Benavent, arose from the desire to revitalize a degraded area which until then was not very popular, despite its central location close to the Duomo. Thanks to the installation of furniture with architectural shapes throughout the square, routes are created of "lines formed with benches, highlighted by lines of light, which bring us into the space from Piazza San Giovanni and once inside invite us to cross the wall and go to the highest point, which allows us to contemplate the Corso Regina Margherita and the surrounding area from the balcony. Once there, we can rest on groups of chairs on the tapestry of grass, go down through the well which takes us to the underground enclosure of the exhibitions and to the exit, toward the three green rugs where three groups of street furniture are arranged as installations, in an unusual manner, reaffirming their capacity as autonomous beings to temporarily become an almost monumental point of reference", in the words of the Barcelona architect.

This action is thus confronted understanding the public space as a provider of services and starting from a pre-existing urban landscape, where the furniture is added to create spatial references, to create a space which in addition to installing benches offers rest, in addition to lamps offers light.

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