Spatial Design for new typologies of places:

in-between urban spaces.

Giovanna Piccinno, Elisa Lega

Abstract
The territory of the third millennium is transforming the ways in which the users
inhabit the space. Our contemporary dynamic condition of urban spaces and places
calls the need to identify new design tools, as advanced as the context where
applied, that must be capable to express new poetics/qualities/meanings for the
nowadays widespread territories, their various urban environments generated and
their configurations.
The formal deconstruction of the contemporary metropolis is a direct consequence
of the processes of social and economic transformations currently underway. Our
Age of Access provides the transition from an economy largely dominated by the
market and the concepts of goods and propriety, in an economy dominated by
intangible values such as culture, information and, mainly, relational aspect
activator of new qualities. In this scenario the Design challenge is to understand the
meanings, roles and the inter-relations of: man (concept of identity), post-industrial
society (global/local), city (multiple civitas) and places (hyper/hybrid).
The post-industrial development has created undecided spaces, no purpose
oriented, which can be called other spaces, areas of refuge for diversity, places of
strong dynamics. Places continually subject to new programs of use, often through
processes of spontaneous re-functionalization.
In this typologies of queer spaces, involving a departure from the notion of
technical functionality of spaces to that of a dynamic semantic system of liminal
places (concept of cultural geography of travel), there is potential for the
in-between spaces - particular urban environments, marginal and residual,
produced by the urban sprawl - to become new meaningful places and hence new
types of public domain.
In this sense the article wants to show how Spatial Design stands as a privileged
design activity for the design of spaces (interior/exterior) and its related
tools/equipments system through innovative environmental relational and logical
configuration strategies - progressive and regressive, even systemic.

Key Words: Spatial Design, in-between urban spaces, territory of the third
millennium, social/economical transformation, interior/exterior, new design tools.

*****

1. The formal deconstruction of the contemporary metropolis

The territory of the third millennium is transforming the ways in which the
users inhabit the space. To focus on the new ways in which space and places are
lived is a creative opportunity that offers challenging areas of experimentation for
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the design disciplines which are constantly operating in a continuous process of
analysis, predicting and understanding the various needs that define contemporary
living, proposing solution that can became spaces, objects or ways of living.
Design disciplines, referring in particular to those related with spatial issues,
always confront themselves with bordering disciplines such as architecture,
communication, urban planning, landscape design and territorial marketing, as well
as other fields, creating contamination and continuous exchange of codes and
languages that enriches the ways in which we design an think of contemporary
urban spaces. In fact our contemporary dynamic and complex condition calls the
need to identify new design tools, as advanced as the context where applied, that
must be capable to express new poetics, qualities and meanings for the nowadays
widespread territories, their various urban environments generated and their
configurations.1
In a scenario of formal deconstruction of the contemporary metropolis, as a
direct consequence of economic and social transformation processes currently
underway, the challenge for the designers of the third millennium is strictly related
to understand the new meanings of:
- Man and in particular the concept of identity which has been enriched by
countless complexity passing through a notion of individual ego to that of an
identity in progress, a layered personalism in which man's identity can be seen as
an everlasting open work;2
- City and the consequences of being widespread, unstructured, and holder of more
civitas,3 each one representing a fragment of society that is generally related to a
lack of identification with the occupancy of the real space that becomes almost
virtual;
- Places and their condition of being or hyper or hybrid, with functional definition
becoming equally progressive and uncertain.
These three paradigm shifts are strictly related to the development of a post-
industrial society built on networked systems, with multiple, ubiquitous and
invisible structures, a system in continuous implementation, continually redefining
the relationship between global and local.
The urban scenario we live in can also be seen as a result of the relocation
process of the big industries, happened in the west mostly during the nineties,
through which has started the creation of two parallel economies: a classic
industrial economy, sectorial and investing in new technologies -automation- to
downsizing the staff, and an extended social economy, based on autonomous
entrepreneurship in the service sector of the micro enterprises and aesthetic
markets, which now spontaneously produces diffuse work and diffuse
technological innovation.4
This last process is generated mainly by the potential offered by information
technology in territories with high density of cultural information and human
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exchanges, in urban markets saturated with relationships, through those dynamics
activated by the new economy, and from what has been called the Age of Access.5
The Age of Access predicts the transition from an economy dominated by the
market and the concepts of goods and property, to an economy dominated by
values such as culture, information and above all, for what matter to us,
relationships.6
Nowadays the relational aspect acts on territory and its environment as an essential
element activator of new values considering that spaces and environments, that
constitute the contemporary urban scenario, are continually subjected to
new programs of functional use, often through processes of spontaneous
re-programming.
Given these premises an adaptable and reversible design approach is
particularly coherent with the contemporary era in which we are living, structured
upon invisible and pervasive networks that are in continuous transformation. These
systems have a profound influence on the ways in which we live and challenge the
rigid models of the function of spaces, defined by the modus vivendi of the XX
century. The previous model was in fact based on shared but rigid codes, which
today are viewed as inadequate if not completely obsolete.7

2. New typologies of spaces generated by the post-industrial development

The indiscriminate urban development has led to the genesis of undecided, no
function related spaces - which can be called other spaces - new urban exterior of
the urban sprawl, third landscape, a land of refuge for diversity, scene of strong
dynamics.8
The reconfiguration of internal urban spaces becomes therefore, in complex cities,
the agent that triggers the metamorphosis of the external urban space, in a
continuous in and out network exchange brought by a different use of the space.
The external urban space is modified by the interaction brought by the fluxes
generated by activities that are located within, fluxes that become progressively
more fluid the more the relation in-out is taking place.
Within this context Spatial Design could become a privileged design activity
for the design of spaces [ interior | exterior ] and its related tools/equipments
system, for the widespread inhabited urban realities of the third millennium,
through innovative relational and configuration strategies, progressive and
regressive, even systemic.9
In particular there is an opportunity for Spatial Design to give value to specific
urban exterior, considered other spaces that are all those interstitial places
constituting the third landscape,10 dynamics, marginal and residual generated by
the urban sprawl. Heterotopias that can become chosen sites for Spatial Design
actions and researches, to activate other forms of urban identity, for a renewed
hospitable capacity.
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By means of Spatial Design the idea of polarities, which usually characterize
our social and spatial organization (e.g. the so-called conflict between private and
public spheres, local and global, physical and virtual realities, etc), can be placed in
discussion in favour to draw a third category of space, a trialectic of spatiality, an
another space where the everyday practice occurs.11
Theorists Lefebvre and Edward W. Soja suggest the actual existence of an
in-between reality, a third instance, by introducing an-Other reality, a different
alternative that both reconstitutes and expands upon the original opposition.12 For
example, it can be said that the amorphous and abstract space between public and
private spaces is in fact a real space that is both-public-and-private, commonly
prefixed with the term semi-, leading to an inter-situation or middle location.
From this point of view it is possible to read, within the urban contest, that third
spaces are now what constitute the common ground for the new public realm and
that its core qualities may also stand for the key attributes of a new spatial
category.

3. In-between urban spaces

Contemporary mobility is now creating continuous spaces of exchange, shifting
the philosophical and built-environment discourses from the fixed spaces of
staying to a new perspective regarding the spaces of transition - the spaces of
change, reuse, interpretation.
The growing of tensions within the urban fabric generates in-between urban
spaces, which interstitial void amplifies the spaces traditionally defined serving,
distributed, potentially turning them into important relational and event spaces.

in-between is the only space of movement of development or

becoming: the in-between defines the space of a certain
virtuality, a potential that always threatens to disrupt the
operations of the identities that constitute it.13

Naming this spatial category in-between is mainly due to the need of

underlining its main value/characteristic, betweenness, both from a spatial and a
temporal point of views.
The diversity and variety of in-between spaces within the urban fabric does not
allow to describe them through fixed pre-categorized types, but leads Spatial
Design to find new tools of interpretation to analyse these complex systems of
queer places through the use of open interpretative categories guided by spatial
characteristic/values and performative quality variables.
A possible analysis of the in-between spaces divides them into two open
categories that differ according to the predominant character component of the
space: in-between spaces understood as discontinuous to the surroundings or
in-between spaces as continuous and/or in transition.
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In-between as discontinuity refers to the concept of limit that arises between
realities considered different and therefore distinguishable. To describe it can be
used a beam of synonyms stressing, in a spatial sense, the character expressed by
the break-off and cracks: crack, fissure, crevice, opening, cavity, recess, gap, hole,
window, as well as distance, separation, rejection, offset, to which is possible to
add additional sense - as that which fills the gap - insertion, insertion interposition.
A second group of terms refers, in a temporal sense, to the discontinuity expressed
by the in-between spaces: break, intermission, interruption, suspension, stop,
pause, respite, delay.
The second open category refers to in-between, as continuity and transition, a limit
that can be exceeded depending on the location and circumstances in one or both
directions, the continuum between space, time or other dimensions. This type of
in-between is characterized by the presence of a line or demarcation band that
establishes a relationship of inclusion/exclusion among internal and external
elements to it. The group of terms related to its spatial value indicates being at the
margin, threshold, edge, rim, border, frontier, limit, end. Even the words that imply
step can be mentioned in this context: transition, transit crossing.

4. Spatial Design for in-between urban space

Studying the in-between spaces offers a good opportunity for Spatial Design to
foster on what are the new meanings for Man as personal identity, City as a system
of multiple civitas and Places as hyper and hybrid.
In terms of personal identity in fact the in-between spaces can be defined as
spaces of weak relations not characterized by forms of instrumental or strong
emotional relationship with the user, the types of bonds that are established within
mainly depend on the configuration of the space in itself, this implies that the
concept of identity transforms itself into temporary belonging notion.
In the space of weak relations are formed memories, identity and relations. 14
These are places in which we randomly cross, and in which the opportunity to
acquire the role of incubators of weak relations is very important for the temporary
rooting of the person. They act as catalysts roots also in another way, through their
recognition understood as episodic. They do not allow the rooting only allowing
the formation of bonds between the people but also because, unconsciously, people
are rooted in relationships with things and materials. As mentioned by Benjamin in
a famous passage: If a wall is breached, there is easier than there the memory
blocks, and not on a wall straight and well-whitened.
The contemporary transient condition imposes in fact a revision of the traditional
categories of interpretation applied to the strategies to build on the concept of
identity and authenticity.
The in-between can be read as a place for social, cultural and environmental
transformations: it is not simply a space suitable for dynamics and realignments,
but it is the only place - the place around identities, between identity - where the
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question of becoming, openness to the future, goes beyond the conservative
impulse to maintain the cohesion and unity.15
Their liminality condition offers a type of in-between cultural/relational state,
which in turn provides the foundations for the spontaneous, immediate, concrete
nature of communities, as opposed to the norm-governed, institutionalized, abstract
nature of social structure.16
Within the contemporary urban field it is getting noticeable the existence of a
new typology of public domain, different form the past agora of public life, where
an event-like experiences take place together with new interpretations and
meanings of spaces. This involves a departure from the notion of technical
functionality of spaces to that of a dynamic semantic system of liminal places,17
getting closer to the concept of cultural geography of travel by which there is
potential for the in-between spaces to become new meaningful places in the city
and hence new types of public domain. Space of which must be sought the cultural
meaning through a transdisciplinary analysis (spatial design, cultural geography,
sociology, etc) shifting the focus from an almost non-cultural analysis of the
function of spaces to one that interpret the space as a system of places, multiple
civitas, with specific meanings for specific groups. This implies a paradigm shift
for the design of the in-between spaces that will have to move from the concept of
technical functionality of spaces to that of performative adaptability.
To understand better the design potentials related to the diversity of the
in-between spaces, it is important to pay attention at the notion of performative
environment, focusing the analysis on what a place really is and not on what it is
said to be. Through a design driven process of analysis it will be possible to
capture several layers of the complex spatial condition of places (relational aspect,
invisible network, hidden behaviours related to the actual use of the place, etc) and
revealing the real spatial relationship established between these places and their
surroundings.
In the essay The Invention of the Everyday, Michel de Certeau provides clues as to
how the shifting new urban landscape might be interpreted, starting from the
definition of space as a junction of shifting entities, animated by the collection of
various movements that occur within its interior.

Hence, space becomes the territory of the shifting and the

precarious; fundamentally, it is the locus of route and passage
In short, space is a place that is put into practice. The street is
geographically defined by urban planner but transformed into an
actual space by those who walk along it.18

The urban landscape cannot be viewed as something static; it is both marked out
and continually contradicted by those who use it, who move along in and practice
it.
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In terms of Spatial Design this has a reflection on the design approach and
program for the in-between urban spaces, which changes from the need of fixed
structures to that of variable and discontinuous tool/equipment systems for the
space.

Space is the producer of the operations which decide its

orientation, its circumstances; which make it a temporal setting
and cause it to function as a polyvalent unity of conflicting
projects of action or of negotiated juxtapositions.19

Outline the distinctive features, in terms of program, behaviour and

relationships, of the in-between places can bring results in the synthetic direction of
capturing aspects related to habitability and urbanity. Spatial Design, in relation
with theoretical and practical inputs generated by bordering disciplines, finds in
this type of domain a new ground where to operate in terms of relational
innovation within the urban spaces, using its non invasive skill to affect the
context, its adaptability and reversibility to the ever-changing needs as a key point
feature to keep the pace with the modern urban metabolism.

Notes
1 Giovanna Piccinno, Space Design. 4 Riflessioni = 4 Lezioni (Rimini: Maggioli, 2008), 53-54.

2 Zygmunt Bauman, Interview on Identity (Bari: Laterza, 2003), 127.

Paul Ricoeur, Tempo e racconto 1 (Milano: Jaca Book, 1986), 15.

3 Paolo Desideri, La citt di latta (Genova: Costa & Nolan, 1995), 74.

4 Andrea Branzi, Weak and Diffuse Modernity (Milano: Skira, 2006), 50-53.

5 Jeremy Rifkin, The Age of access (New York: Ken Tarcher/Putnam, 2000).

6 Kevin Kelly, New rules for the new economy, (New York: Penguin Books, 1998).

7 Piccinno, Space design, VIII.

8 Michel Foucault, Spazi altri. I luoghi delle eterotopie, ed. Salvo Vaccaro (Milano: Italy, 2001), 22-32.
Gilles Clment, Manifeste du Tiers paysage (Paris: Editions Sujet/Objet L'Autre Fable, 2004), 10.

9 Piccinno, Space design, 20.

1 Gilles Clment, Manifeste du Tiers paysage (Paris: Editions Sujet/Objet L'Autre Fable, 2004), 11.
10

11
1 Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 117.

12 Edward Soja, Thirdspace: Expanding the Scope of the Geographical Imagination. Architecturally Speaking:
Practices of Art, Architecture and the Everyday (New York: Routledge, 2000), 20.

13 Elisabeth Grosz, Architecture from the Outside (London: The MIT press, 2001), 92-93.

14 Giuseppe Micheli, Dentro la Citt. Forme dellHabitat e Pratiche Sociali. (Milano: Franco Angeli, 2001), 13.

1 Grosz, Architecture from the Outside, 90.

15

16 Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Strucure and anti-structure (London: Routledge, 1969) 34-37.

17 Maarten Hajer and Arnold Reijndorp, In Search of New Public Domain: Analysis and Strategy (Rotterdam: NAI
Publishers, 2001), 130.
18 de Certeau, Practice of Everyday Life, 117.

19 Ibid., 175.

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Giovanna Piccinno is an Architect and Associate Professor at Politecnico di Milano, School of Design. Her main research
interests cover the fields of Spatial Design, Interior Design and Product Design. She is director of the Spatial Design
Teamwork, INDACO Department, Politecnico di Milano, a research group focused on how the territory of the third
millennium is transforming the ways in which the users inhabit the space due to the spreading of new typologies of space
and places.

Elisa Lega is a PhD student in Design at Politecnico di Milano, INDACO Department, where she runs
a research that investigates the role of in-between spaces in contemporary urban scenarios through a
transdisciplinary approach, focusing in particular on Spatial Design. She is member of the Spatial
Design Teamwork.