Urban resilience and industrial design: technologies, materials and forms of the new public space

The new paradigms of the distributed productions and the new environmental sustainability requirements have radically changed the relationships between people and urban spaces and has introduced a new system of aesthetical and ethical references with a deep influence on the identity of the contemporary city. The necessity for the city to be ‘resilient’ requires new interpretations on what is ‘permanent’ and what is ‘temporary’ and this affects the fields of architectural construction and industrial design. The capacity of adaptability to changes is for the city a great opportunity but nonetheless it represents a risk at a time when the solutions and the decisions are taken into a ‘virtual’ dimension without any dialogue with the real conditions of the urban context. On the other side, if the productive and economical transformations may determine a slight change in the physical aspects of the city, under a social point of view we always have strong impacts not necessarily immediately visible. In this perspective, architecture and industrial design can give an important contribution to detect and control these changes, trying to maintain, according to the community needs and requirements, a high level of quality for the public space, in social terms. Which are the new technologies, the innovative materials and forms of the new urban public space? Which is the role of design in the definition of quality standards for the contemporary public space? Which are the contours of the new social dimension of industrial design and its relationship with architecture? Starting from the analysis of the dichotomies ‘temporary/permanent’, ‘virtual/real’ and ‘aesthetical/ethical’, this contribution aims at investigating the relationship between urban resilience and industrial design in the new public spaces of the contemporary city, trying to give an answer to these important questions