Continuità funzionali e discontinuità industriali. Il caso dello stabilimento Massalin Particulares S.R.L in Merlo (Argentina)

The analysis of the documents conserved in the Olivetti archives, together with the original project documents kept on site and the inspection carried out at the Massalin Particulares plant in Merlo (Argentina) allowed a detailed understanding of the current overall conditions that Olivetti of Ivrea (Italy) built in 1961 about 30 kilometers from Buenos Aires. Over the years, Marco Zanuso's project has demonstrated not only the structural validity (with the famous hollow beams used for air conditioning), but also distributive and functional flexibility. The original production of calculating machines in fact was interrupted in 1979, after not even twenty years of activity and the plant was acquired by Massalin y Celasco (now Massalin Particulares) who converted it to the production of cigarettes: precisely the ability to quickly manage this sensitive industrial discontinuity allowed to maintain the functional continuity of the architectural container, whose excellence is today still fully legible and usable (also for the care and surveillance of the current property, part of the Phillip Morris group). Preserving an industrial building while maintaining its productive vocation is also a sustainable choice because it allows to avoid the waste of materials, energy and soil, but it is also useful for social and territorial sustainability, because it maintains efficient social networks and territorial infrastructures otherwise destined to languish. In the case of the Merlo plant, its innovative concept and its excellent adaptability have encouraged this continuity of operation not only of the factory itself, but also of the local context, also carefully designed by Zanuso (and wanted by Adriano Olivetti): in the large park around the plant there still many of the original trees, the canteen is still used by the employees, the kindergarten is reused as a social center and training for the staff, the district school maintains its social utility intact and the houses are still inhabited. The exemplarity of the case of Massalin of Merlo suggests adopting policies that involve local communities in spreading awareness of the value of the building and its potential benefit on the territory, encouraging the knowledge and training of designers as well as the establishment of tools, methods and contributions for the maintenance, conservation and enhancement of the complex over time.