The Aim
The city of Milan has recognised the need to address its future by negotiating and integrating its past through design process. The design studio aims to participate in this process.

Objective of this Program
To consciously deal with issues of Milan’s valuable as well as degenerating inheritance with contemporary demands. It is also to bring about sensitive connection between historicity and modernity. Neither overpowering the other. At the same time to address philosophical position of emerging identity.

Contents
The Architectural Design Studio conceives the design process as the synthetic moment in which all the issues coming from the context (being social, economic, architectural, artistic or relational), filtered through a conscious and targeted design will, originate a possible reality. In the ongoing debate between tradition, modernity and contemporaneity, between building typology and urban morphological principles, representative demands and language issues, every architecture project needs to deal with the complexity of reality, continually redefining its reference horizon. In this sense, the project will not merely be a response to certain specific conditions but should aim at a broader character of generality; at the same time, it is also necessary that the definition of the architecture is plausible, detailed, coherent.

Methodology
The Architectural Design Studio provides a different and complementary set of activities. The focus of all of them will be the project , which will be developed in small groups during the entire semester. The projects will be discussed weekly with the teaching group. Lectures will provide an overview of the complexity and multiplicity of the different possible points of view in or around the architecture (including references to other cultures and other disciplines, from visual arts to philosophy, from cinema to sociology), with the aim of stimulating students curiosities and doubts. Guided architectural visits in Milan and Italy, as well as a study trip, will be organized.

The Debate
Interventions in historic contexts have generated extensive debates across the world. To conform to the existing built environment or make aggressive modern insertions (incursions) remains a matter of debate. A designer expresses his/her ideology to bring about the new setting. The studio will encourage this debate and students to take position.

Functional Program
The Architectural Design Studio activities will develop within the frame of “Re-forming Milan”, a collaborative program between the School of Architecture and Milan Municipality focusing on degraded and neglected areas and buildings in Milan. The best projects will be part of an exhibition which will take place in an institutional space after the end of the courses. The Architectural Design Studio will focus on two different case-studies (each group of students choosing one of them), presenting different problems and scales. In both cases the main function will be housing, mixed, in different proportions, with public and/or commercial facilities.

Presentation
It is expected that students will carry out research in related areas and articulate their thoughts. Drawings, sketches, photographs will support theoretical understanding. Making actual scale models will be an important part of the studio work.

The oral exam will consist of a discussion which, starting from the presented design proposal, will  test the student's consciousness and ability to relate to the theoretical contents of the course and the bibliography.