Sheep track as "project matrix" of a landscape ‘in becoming’. Notes of an ongoing research

For an architect, dealing with the theme of landscape is never easy. Perhaps because we are conditioned by the exclusivity of those disciplinary sectors basically hyperspecialized that, as such, inevitably tend to exclude any form of synthetic-transformative matrix: the project. In contrast to this position, the essay synthetize the work of an ongoing research focused on the theme of recovering of the settlement heritage linked to the "track routes" of the Apuglia region. Particularly, starting from a theoretical speculation concerning the meaning that the ‘landscape project’ should have, the scientific contribution proposes the assumption of the ‘track route network’ as a planning matrix through which to actively recover the several morphological-settlement conditions of the Apulian landscape. The intention is to identify methodological and design indications (to be collected possibly within a real design manual aimed at recovering settlement systems) capable of encouraging design practices addressed towards an active and systematic recovery (in terms of securing, re-adapting, refunctionalization) of the Apulian landscape settlement heritage, making it available through a slow and itinerant form of tourism.