Le front de mer de Messine : hypothèses de sauvegarde et valorisation

Messina is a city whose urban structure results from a tormented dialogue with the past. Its history is marked by serious destruction, which led to the loss of important identity characters, to the detriment of its fragile image. The introduction of modern figuration into Sicilian culture comes after the First World War through the construction of new public buildings. An important contribution is offered in 1939 by the contest for the realization of the new Palazzata. The very restrictive competition announcement requires a project that could recall the monumentality of the former maritime theater, an important symbol of the grandeur and importance of the city, erected for the first time between 1622 and 1624 by the architect S. Gullì, destroyed in 1783 and rebuilt from 1801 to be again annihilated by the earthquake of 28 December 1908. The impossibility of creating a single building, according to the constraints imposed by ant seismic regulation, imposes a new construction spread over thirteen blocks. The selection committee will choose the project proposed by G. Samonà, C. Autore, R. Leone and G. Viola, a group of Sicilian architects and engineers. The initial idea centred on a central axis perpendicular to the façade of the Town Hall and reinforced by the presence of two fountains as high as the neighbouring buildings. It also envisaged the union of groups of buildings through portals and colonnades in order to interrupt the continuous front in correspondence with monuments of a certain importance. It was in accordance with these rules that the first buildings of the Palazzata were built. However, the political and cultural changes of both the fascist period and the World War II will profoundly influence the architectural style of the buildings, thereby destroying the stylistic unity claimed by the project. The town plans established in the 1980s, inadequate harbour works and, finally, the construction of the tramway line will irremediably debase this key element in the history of the city, today dilapidated. This paper, therefore, intends to retrace the main phases of its conception and evolution, and to propose hypotheses for its safeguarding and valorisation, which would enable Messina and its citizens to find and re-establish this founding relationship with the sea, inexplicably currently denied and unfortunately lost.