Off

OFF is an academic gathering revolving around the recognised state of being off-focus.

Rather than renouncing knowledge, the blurred view encourages creative unease and the embrace of lateral questioning and permanent enquiry.

OFF collects random subjects and artefacts relating to architecture, urbanism and landscape, prividing material for debate.



MEMBERS

Elisa Bacilieri (UniRomaTre) / Federico Broggini (UniFe) / Silvio Cristiano (UniFi) / Fabrizio D’Angelo (UniRomaTre/UniFi) / Alessandro Delli Ponti (UniFe) / Silvia Farano (UniRomaTre) / Federico Marchese (Polito) / Ilaria Maurelli (UniRomaTre) / Emilia Nardella (UniRomaTre) / Sofia Nicoletti Altimari (UniRomaUno) / Giordana Panella (UniRomaTre) / Marco Ranzato (UniRomaTre) / Riccardo Ruggeri (Polito) / Valeria Volpe (UniRomaTre)

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INDEX



DISRUPTION
Monteverde Goes Down / The Construction Site of Imagination / Urban Disruptions as Laboratories for Innovation / Resurgence / The Story of KraterENERGYPositive Energy Districts / Paesaggio Elettrodomestico / Cena Elettrica
SOIL Asphalt Soils
BIOCLIMATICFrigidarium / Alfresco / Spazio Pubblico e Nuove Alleanze / Microclimatic Snapshopts / Ostiense Bioclimatica / Marciapiede Fresco / Borgofresco / Frigidarium
CONSTRUCTION SITE
Roma Cantiere Eterno / Trace / Cantieri Istantanei

FOOD
Convivio dell’Abbondanza URBAN-RURAL
 No–City FossileFertile CARTOGRAPHY
Amphibious Cartoghraphies
SPATIAL JUSTICE Reframing Spatial Justice / Eccedenza
WORKS





Asphalt Soils. Paradoxes and Reappraisals in Urban Landscapes

SOIL
2022-2025 / PhD Thesis / Rome, Italy

Asphalt Soils explores soil conceptions in contemporary urban landscape, using asphalt as the main lens of investigation. Asphalt is generally considered to be the material that symbolises the most harmful conditions in cities.



Frigidarium

BIOCLIMATIC

2020 / Installation / Rome, Italy

Is a series of temporary public installations providing cooling relief. Facing Rome's extreme summer heat, these "micro-climate shelters" protect health and reduce energy needs by harnessing the cooling power of rainwater and local fountains throughout the city’s streets and squares.



Marciapiede Fresco

BIOCLIMATIC

2023-ongoing / Research-Installation / Rome, Italy

Is an ongoing ecological transition experiment in Rome that aims to transform urban surfaces to improve microclimate and public space quality. Urban heat islands—intensified by dark asphalt, lack of vegetation, and impermeable surfaces—raise temperatures and energy consumption, especially in areas like Ostiense. The project applies “cool materials,” such as reflective white paint, to reduce heat absorption and mitigate these effects. Implemented near a school, it also acts as a tool for environmental awareness and education, combining research, design, and community engagement.



Convivio dell’Abbondanza

FOOD2024-2025 / Master Thesis / Emilia Romagna, Italy

Convivio dell’Abbondanza investigates food preservation from pre-refrigeration devices to the contemporary cold chain, reinterpreting it as an urban device capable of reactivating the public dimension, restoring to the square its function as a place of common life and collective care.



Cena Elettrica

ENERGY

14-05-2025 / Event / Rome, Italy

CENA ELETTRICA functions as an anticipatory rehearsal of urban blackout, staged at Lo Spizio (Rome). By simulating total power failure, researchers and students investigate methods to adapt and emancipate from systemic dependence on electrical infrastructures. This "sinelectric" banquet tests adaptive strategies for energy sufficiency, renegotiating the relationships with everyday objects in moments of crisis.



Alfresco

BIOCLIMATIC

2025 / Installation / Rome, Italy

ALFRESCO is a cooling device designed to "hack" a public drinking fountain (a Nasone) located near Lo Spizio. It consists of a single metal sheet, rolled to create two open sections for inserting drinks and food. ALFRESCO is placed directly under the fountain's stream of cold water. The metal’s high thermal conductivity allows the coolness of the running water to be transferred to the food and beverages inside.


Reframing Spatial Justice

SPATIAL JUSTICE
2022-ongoing / Research / Cavallino-Venice-Asiago, Italy; Fiumicino-Rome-Rieti, Italy; Gela-Catania, Italy

Reframing Spatial Justice examines how post-pandemic public investments interact with existing territorial inequalities across Italy. Focusing on the uneven distribution of services, infrastructures, and environmental resources, the project combines mapping, fieldwork, and cooperative inquiry to explore how PNRR measures might support fairer and more spatially just futures.


Roma Cantiere Eterno

CONSTRUCTION SITE

2024-2025 / Master Thesis / Rome, Italy

By 2025, Jubilee and PNRR funds have turned Rome into a landscape of construction sites. This research analyzes urban transformations through these sites, redefining them as temporary interfaces where diverse agencies collide: a potential, open tool for innovation and city planning.



Amphibious Cartoghraphies

CARTOGRAPHY
2022-2025 / Video Installation / Venice, Italy

To broaden the perspective on Gaia's deep time and investigate the fluid dynamics that continuously hybridize sea and land, five amphibian cartographies of the central Mediterranean area are proposed, capturing the oscillating boundary between the emerged and the submerged. Each map observes distinct elements which, through their own specificity, make the demarcation of Terræ Aquæ fluid by employing different exposure and observation times.


Reclaiming the Potential of Urban Vacant
Open Spaces. The Story of Krater

DISRUPTION
2025 / Scientific Article / Ljubljana, Slovenia

In contemporary cities, there are hidden gems of immense potential: Terrain Vague, open abandoned spaces where spontaneous nature thrives. In recent years, emerging practices have sought to activate these spaces through experimental approaches integrating ecological, cultural, and social interests. However, the lack of a legal framework recognizing spontaneous urban nature and self-governed initiatives hinders their integration into public policies. This article presents the story of Krater, an experimental project initiated by a multidisciplinary collective in a terrain vague in Ljubljana, detailing its development, challenges, and goals. The article contributes to the broader debate on legitimizing spontaneous urban nature, promoting multi-species cities, recognizing the value of terrain vague, and highlighting the role of urban commons.


Summer School NO-CITY 2025 FossileFertile 

URBAN-RURAL 2025 / Research - Pedagogy / Charleroi, Belgium

Charleroi, historically one of Europe’s key industrial hubs, developed as a coal and steel powerhouse within  the emerging conceptual framework of the so-called ‘Fossil Crescent’. This region, stretching from northern England through Belgium, Germany, and into Poland’s Silesian basin, was shaped by the extensive extraction of coal over centuries. Fertility and fossility are central to this NO-CITY Summer School exploration. Here, fertility is not limited to its agricultural sense but refers to the capacity of a post-extractivist landscape to be reimagined, reintegrated, and transformed. What forms of fertility emerge in the wake of industrial activities? If fossility has supported a fertility that has been quickly exhausted, how can we consider the fertility of the Charleroi region in light of the material legacy of fossil?


Paesaggio  Elettrodomestico

ENERGY
2022-ongoing / Research / Rome, Italy

“Paesaggio Elettrodomestico” is an ethnographic research that explores the relationship between domestic space, urban space, and energy practices. The research uses various visual aids to understand and spatialize how energy-related practices—linked to the use of household appliances or to the pursuit of comfort—affect the characteristics of both domestic and urban contexts.


Borgofresco

BIOCLIMATIC
2025 - ongoing / Research / Val di Fiastra, Italy

BorgoFresh explores how festivals and temporary events in inner areas can become sites for experimenting with climate adaptation and shared environmental comfort. Developed in Val di Fiastra through a co-design process with Borgofuturo and the local network Errante, the project combines the monitoring of environmental conditions and event impacts with the testing of modular, low-tech, and transportable prototypes for shade, cooling, and small-scale energy generation. In this way, temporary events are reimagined as laboratories for more resilient, inclusive, and climate-responsive public space solutions.


Ostiene Bioclimatica. Strategie per la transizione energetica urbana

BIOCLIMATIC
2022-2023 / Master Thesis / Rome, Italy


Ostiense Bioclimatica is a contribution to the European research project PED4ALL, in which the Department of Architecture of Roma Tre University is a partner and which has its own case study in the Ostiense area of Rome. The assumption of PED4ALL is that positive energy districts (PED) can also be implemented in complex, highly heterogeneous urban contexts where conditions of energy poverty also exist. Ostiense Bioclimatica  highlights that such a perspective on effective energy transition requires a broad perspective that is not focused solely on energy production from renewable sources, but rather on a more radical process of urban transformation.