Recording reception and perceptions of urban spaces redesigned under Fascism

Following a comparative approach, the article focuses on Italian urban redesign under the Fascism. Two decades sufficed to Mussolini to rebuild the country (1922-1943) putting, pragmatically, into practice his slogan: “Walk and build”. In this short period of time, the architects built new towns and hundreds of modern infrastructures (i.e. railway stations, post offices, courts) which are still in use throughout Italy. Furthermore, the historic urban landscape of many Italian towns profoundly changed due to Marcello Piacentini’s urban projects. These changes – involving extensive demolition and reconstruction of the city centres - still to characterise the public spaces of many Italian urban areas from the North to the South, from Milan to Bari. Before the foundation of the Fascist empire (1936), the urban redesign was conceived as 'instrumentum regni' and its architecture, paradoxically, did not demonstrate a stylistic unity being both traditionalist and modern. After the conquest of Ethiopia, there was a crucial totalitarian change and the architecture was conceived as a mass medium used to educate. The new style was supposed to be a general expression of Italian people's will, becoming one of the distinguishing features of the Italian dictatorship. The renewed urban landscape was intended to change the “identity code” of people and its pedagogical mission was directed to future generations. Through the analysis of different visual sources available on-line, this article aims at answering the following questions. How do citizens and tourists perceive these urban spaces today? Can the urban spaces built under Mussolini's regime still demonstrate the utility and the ability to adapt to contemporary needs? The aforementioned questions may answer the crucial ones. May we state that the ambition to colonise history has been achieved? Nowadays, is the regime architecture recognised as a common heritage of Italy and Europe?