Adaptive Reuse meets Student Living in Milan
Park Associati's latest transformation challenges the conventional approach to student housing, breathing new life into Milan's former agricultural consortium. This adaptive reuse project preserves the memory of a 1940s industrial landmark while creating a vibrant community for over 700 students in Via Ripamonti.
Working with the building's rich historical context, the studio has crafted a sophisticated dialogue between past and present. "Our vision was to honor the site's industrial heritage while creating spaces that nurture both learning and community," explains Filippo Pagliani, Founding Partner of Park Associati. "Rather than erasing the past, we've allowed it to guide us toward new possibilities for student living."
The design approach celebrates contrasts. The original building retains its powerful industrial presence through grey plaster and sandstone, now crowned by a contemporary addition that seems to float above the historic facade. Alongside it, a new extension rises with its own distinct identity, creating a harmonious counterpoint through a rhythmic play of glass and metal.
Between these two volumes emerges the heart of the project – a courtyard that serves as an outdoor living room for the student community. This space dissolves boundaries between study and leisure, offering green areas for relaxation alongside spaces for sports and social interaction. "We wanted to create a place where students could move fluidly between focused study and spontaneous connection" continues Pagliani.
A colored staircase leads to a basement level that houses everything from a cinema to music rooms, while the ground floor offers fluid spaces for studying, meeting, and sharing ideas. Custom furnishings in wood and bold colors bring warmth to the industrial setting, creating intimate spaces within the larger whole.
In the residential areas, the studio has turned architectural constraints into opportunities. Each living space, whether a cozy single room or an innovative duplex studio, balances private retreat with community connection. The cluster apartments offer a particularly innovative solution, creating small communities where 8 to 12 students share living spaces while maintaining their private domains.
On the upper floors, study rooms and communal terraces offer sweeping views of Milan. A surprising highlight emerges on the fourth floor of the new building – a basketball court that transforms sport into a celebration of community life.
"This project represents more than just student housing," reflects Michele Rossi, Founding Partner of Park Associati. "It's about creating a place where Milan's industrial heritage becomes a backdrop for new ways of living and learning, where historical memory and contemporary life engage in constant dialogue."
About
Park Associati is an interdisciplinary collective of architects, designers, researchers and innovators, united by the desire to shape the future of the built environment. Founded in Milan in 2000 by Filippo Pagliani and Michele Rossi, the studio operates across architectural, urban, landscape, interior, and product design, championing an interdisciplinary approach.
Every project developed by Park Associati inhabits its own specific context, from the Regione Lombardia skyscraper to the headquarters of Luxottica and Salewa, from residential and retail spaces to the revitalization of modernist buildings or entire neighborhoods. Park Associati immerses itself in the deep richness of each design opportunity, to uncover its inherent identity and deliver a transformative vision. One that’s new, unique and coherent in all its elements.
Operating at the intersection between tradition and innovation, the studio excels at reinterpreting and regenerating cities to become new models of liveability and sustainability, using adaptive reuse as a core strategy.
The collective looks far ahead, anticipating the full impact of its architecture. By doing so, Park Associati gives form to a multitude of experiences, researches and perspectives, striving to enrich lives and foster a new bond between people, places and planet.
Park Associati has won numerous awards, including the Premio Architetto Italiano 2024 granted by the Consiglio Nazionale degli Architetti Pianificatori Paesaggisti e Conservatori.
