Bringing the Backstage to the City
Bringing the Backstage to the City
Magnifica Fabbrica
Magnifica Fabbrica
Status:
International Competition
Year:
2023
Type:
Culture · Workplace
Size:
67.000 sqm
Client:
Comune di Milano
Location:
Milan, Italy
A factory designed to be experienced
The project brings together two conditions usually kept apart: the efficiency of a highly specialized production facility and the experience of a cultural institution. A central promenade organizes the complex, separating logistics and production at ground level from an elevated visitor route five metres above.
From this suspended path, visitors can observe scenography workshops, costume production and rehearsals without interfering with the people at work. The making of theatre becomes part of the architecture itself — revealing the knowledge, craft and collective effort behind every performance.
The stage tower becomes an urban landmark
The transparent Stage Tower defines the entrance to Magnifica Fabbrica and anchors a new public square along Via Rubattino. Reproducing the dimensions of La Scala's original stage tower, the 33-metre-high structure transforms theatrical machinery into a spatial experience: moving scenic elements are suspended above a stepped public interior, while an elevated walkway brings visitors directly into the vertical space of the stage. Relazione MF
Outside, the square becomes the project's city stage. Its geometry recalls the horseshoe configuration of La Scala's auditorium, extending the identity of the theatre into public space and making the act of arrival itself part of the performance.
Turning the backstage into a city stage
Magnifica Fabbrica brings the hidden world of Teatro alla Scala into the public life of Milan. Workshops, scenography, costume production and rehearsal spaces are brought together within a new cultural and productive complex where the processes behind the performance become part of the experience itself.
At its centre, a transparent reinterpretation of La Scala's stage tower moves one of the theatre's most recognizable spatial devices into the city. What is normally concealed behind the stage becomes visible, transforming the entrance to the complex into a place where production, performance and public life meet.
A factory designed to be experienced
The project brings together two conditions usually kept apart: the efficiency of a highly specialized production facility and the experience of a cultural institution. A central promenade organizes the complex, separating logistics and production at ground level from an elevated visitor route five metres above.
From this suspended path, visitors can observe scenography workshops, costume production and rehearsals without interfering with the people at work. The making of theatre becomes part of the architecture itself — revealing the knowledge, craft and collective effort behind every performance.
The stage tower becomes an urban landmark
The transparent Stage Tower defines the entrance to Magnifica Fabbrica and anchors a new public square along Via Rubattino. Reproducing the dimensions of La Scala's original stage tower, the 33-metre-high structure transforms theatrical machinery into a spatial experience: moving scenic elements are suspended above a stepped public interior, while an elevated walkway brings visitors directly into the vertical space of the stage. Relazione MF
Outside, the square becomes the project's city stage. Its geometry recalls the horseshoe configuration of La Scala's auditorium, extending the identity of the theatre into public space and making the act of arrival itself part of the performance.
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