Mercato dei Fiori in Pescia (1948-1951): Design Inventiveness and Constructional Experimentation in Italy after the Second World War

Abstract

After the Second World War, Italy shifted within a few years from post-war reconstruction to the economic “boom”, attracting international attention with a series of highly original works and extraordinary examples of structural and constructional experimentation despite a strong technological delay compared to other industrialised countries.
In the immediate aftermath of the war, projects in which formal invention was closely linked to innovation in materials and structures developed all over Italy, creating a “built catalogue” of experimental techniques. Brick was among the materials that were widely available and deeply rooted in the traditional building. Indeed, the development of the so-called “reinforced brick” in the interwar period had paved the way to the construction of thin, light structures that could be built saving time and costs.
One of the first and most significant Italian experiments with this material was the Mercato dei Fiori (Flowers Market) in Pescia, Tuscany. It was the work of a team composed of architects Giuseppe Giorgio Gori, Leonardo Ricci, Leonardo Savioli, and Enzo Gori, along with the engineer Emilio Brizzi. The presence of four architects and one engineer in the group meant that the two aspects of the project – design and construction – were both thoroughly studied and intimately connected. This was the key to the successful combination of structural boldness and formal originality that made this building a case study in post-war Italian architecture and also earned it international fame. This structure still remains an important testimony to a formidable period of constructional experimentation in post-war Italy; the analyses of its material and structural aspects, which have not been considered so far by scholarly studies on either the building or its authors, represent fundamental investigative tools for fully understanding its value and innovation.
The paper proposes an analysis of the Market’s space and compositional principles relying upon a deep understanding of its structural conception, since the simplicity and lightness of the final result were only possible thanks to the innovative adoption of technological solutions that were widely known but still used infrequently or in different settings.