Revitalizing Casamicciola: Massimiliano Fuksas' Vision for a Resilient Future

"My goal is to change the fate of Casamicciola, a place that, despite the major catastrophes that have struck it, remains incredibly beautiful": these are the words of Massimiliano Fuksas, the 80-year-old star architect who is officially at work from today to design the redevelopment and regeneration of the Ischian municipality hit by an earthquake and a flood within a few years. The two natural disasters have left their mark especially in the upper part of the town, with the area of Piazza Maio practically unusable almost entirely after the earthquake of 2017, with many buildings kept standing by support scaffolding, that of Piazza Bagni hit hard by the flood at the end of November 2022 and with other areas to be redeveloped also in relation to the tourism crisis. For Fuksas, Casamicciola, and more generally the entire island of Ischia, are beautiful, with territory and landscapes still intact and a building abuse that has been substantially exaggerated in relation to its actual spread and the concrete effects produced on an island of over 46 square kilometers. "In Casamicciola there is widespread beauty, with many buildings of architectural value that I intend to enhance and appropriately insert in my project: I am thinking, for example, of the complex of the Pio Monte della Misericordia which, despite many years of abandonment, remains beautiful perhaps more than the same Albergo dei Poveri in Naples and deserves to be recovered and relaunched, as will also be relaunched the huge thermal heritage that this municipality has always had," concludes Massimiliano Fuksas, whose appointment was formally made with an ordinance of the extraordinary commissioner for the Reconstruction of Ischia, Giovanni Legnini, shared with the mayor of Casamicciola, Giosi Ferrandino. The mayor does not hide his enthusiasm: "Casamicciola deserved the best for its rebirth and I believe that the architect Fuksas is the right choice; I am sure he will be able to blend our history, our beauties, and his extraordinary skill into a project that the whole world will talk about. Meanwhile, we carry forward the reconstruction of the town, in full synergy with Commissioner Legnini, and we are ready to welcome tourists who will choose us this summer for their vacations." Massimiliano Fuksas is considered a genius of contemporary architecture, known worldwide for his iconic and innovative works and one of the greatest Italian and world designers of the last decades: after working with Giorgio De Chirico, he was a professor at the École Spéciale d'Architecture in Paris, the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Stuttgart, and Columbia University in New York, receiving in 2006 the Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Institute of British Architects. Among his most famous works are the Nuvola in Rome, the Ferrari development center in Maranello, the Armani Tower in Ginza, Japan, the Zénith Music Hall in Strasbourg, the Shenzhen Bao'an International Airport in China, and the Tbilisi Service Centre in Georgia.