Periurban Transitions. Images of a Landmark on the Tyrrhenian Coast

This study is one of the results of a wider research, still ongoing, on the representation of the material and immaterial qualities of architecture, here declined compared to some projects, past and present, expressed by the complex of the former Meccanica Romana near Ostia Antica, among the most interesting examples of Roman industrial archaeology; an architectural complex connotating the Tyrrhenian coast which has been the subject of diverse plans and strategies for years. The main objective of this research phase – shared in investigative mode by some scholars from the area of Drawing of the Department of Architecture of the University “G. d’Annunzio” Chieti-Pescara – is to structure processes for the representation of the qualities this heritage, through architectural and environmental survey actions supported by the languages of Drawing and Photography, with the intention of providing documentary pieces of knowledge. The complexity of the metropolitan area of Rome and this area in particular, as part of the archaeological landscape system of the coastline of imperial Rome, and the strategies of the Superintendence and research is widely documented in numerous contributions from scholars, from which this phase of research started to explore what is still remaining of the identity of this heritage. In this scenario, research allowed to compose images – in the form of four Polaroid sequences – of the current state useful to reveal the integrity of a unique and extraordinary spatial value: testifying and documenting the transition of an architectural complex, a fulcrum and landmark in the Tyrrehenian coast, from a steel-factory to a dreams-factory.