Luciano Pia

Architecture and Nature reconciled IQD 81

BIOGRAPHY

Born in October 1960, Luciano Pia graduated in Architecture in 1984 from the Politecnico di Torino, with a specialization in environmentally sustainable architecture. After a brief research experience at the Department of Sciences and Techniques for Settlement Processes at the Politecnico di Torino, he has been an Assistant Professor at the Politecnico di Milano since 1992, where he teaches Architectural Conservation. In 1999, he served as a Contract Professor at the Scuola Superiore Normale di Pisa, Cortona campus, for the Master’s program in Museography and Cultural Heritage. Since 1987, he has been a member of the Ordre des Architectes de l’Île-de-France in Paris, where he carried out professional practice – primarily focused on restoration and adaptive reuse projects – from 1990 to 2000, in collaboration with Professor Andrea Bruno. Since 2000, he has been running his own architectural practice in Turin, with a strong focus on energy efficiency and low environmental impact. Since 2010, Luciano Pia has lectured and led workshops on ecologically sustainable architecture at Université Laval in Québec City, the Politecnico di Torino and the Politecnico di Milano, Curtin University of Technology in Perth, and for the Australian Institute of Architects (RAIA). His design research pays particular attention to the distinctive identity of place, combining interventions on existing buildings with new projects aimed at improving energy performance and reducing environmental impact. His professional portfolio ranges from urban-scale projects to residential architecture, consistently informed by contextual sensitivity and sustainability. Alongside his extensive professional activity—recognized through numerous national and international awards—Luciano Pia continues to pursue academic research into alternative design methodologies, with a particular focus on energy consumption and environmental impact.

ARCHITECTURE AND NATURE RECONCILED

For far too long, architecture has been conceived as an aseptic, unnatural element, an artefact – made by art – born from the conviction of human superiority over the rest of the living world. Today, perhaps, we seem finally aware that our limits are no different from those of other living organisms, and that our work as architects must inevitably engage with the contexts in which we intervene. We have already compromised much of our environment with roads, cities, ports, and agricultural exploitation; the time has come to pause, to recognize the damage, and to rebuild a relationship with nature that non-consumerist cultures have managed to preserve. Greenery is territory, and we are part of that same territory: we are natural beings among natural beings. There is no true separation between humans, animals, plants or minerals. Without the natural world, we could not exist.