Imagine Milan

Promoters
Politecnico di Milano, Design Dep. and Design School, IMAGIS research group

Partners
Comune di Milano (Milan City Council) and Storie Digitali; De.de.p., Zup!, Consiglio di Zona 9, Coltivando, Polisocial.

Keywords
audiovisual storytelling | listening | envisioning | promoting | participatory video

Website
Immagina Milano

Context

Imagine Milan is an educational and research program started in 2009, which investigates audiovisual communication formats as tools for dialogue and social innovation focusing on the topic of urban transformation.
The first segment, “Walking Milan” (2009-2010), was focused on the theme of sustainable and pedestrian mobility, in collaboration with the Mobility, Transport and Environment Sector of the City Council of Milan.
The second edition “Street Tales” was focused on the topic of social relations, still in collaboration with the Mobility, Transport and Environment Sector of the City Council of Milan and Storie Digitali.
Both the editions involved staff and students of the 2nd year graduate program in Communication Design in the School of Design for the definition of a cross-media communication strategy and a system of short audiovisual formats: miniDOC (5min.), video-scenarios (3min.) and advertising commercials (30sec.).
In the last edition, “The changing city”, audiovisual formats (Minidoc, commercials) were devoted to six current issues: green cities, smart cities, sustainable mobility, multiculturalism, suburbs, and social memory.

The process was developed in three main sections: listening to the environment through the documentation of transformations in progress and already existing good practices; video interviews and the research into film footage and iconographic catalogues; and visualization of scenarios for sustainable mobility to activate negotiations and conversations between the Comune di Milano, internal stakeholders and actors (technicians and politicians), and the external ones (district councils, associations, merchants and other stakeholders). This would result in the promotion of sustainable mobility values, a cycling and walking culture as a means of socialization and re-appropriation of urban spaces.

Concept
The Imagine Milan project proposes a collaborative approach between Comune di Milano and the research team, testing activities and practices of co-design for social innovation. The research process integrates the communication project with the experimentation of innovative tools for collaboration: semifinished artifacts, such as mood-boards communicating the imagery of the area, storyboards and basic visual tools would be useful during workshops and round-tables with citizens and institutions. It is based on the critique of a possible future, allowing needs to emerge and stakeholders to share a common path of growth.

Strategy
Videos are instruments for the common and internal dialogue among decision makers involved in the design of infrastructure and, above all, promoters of a new idea of Milan as a sustainable city.

Project objectives:

Promoting a sustainable mobility culture;
Building and promoting a new image of Milan;
Facilitating dialogue between Comune di Milano and stakeholders.

Activities
Listening to the environment through the documentation of the transformations in progress and the good practices already active; video interviews with citizens, workers and commuters, associations, craftsmen and companies; the search of footage and iconographic repertoires to reconstruct the memory and consolidate the imagery of places, through the consultation of libraries, archives and the collaboration with Storie Digitali. Output: miniDOC.
Visualization of scenarios for sustainable mobility for activating the negotiating-tables and conversations between Comune di Milano, internal stakeholders and actors (technicians and politicians) and the external ones (district councils, associations, merchants and other stakeholders). Output: video-scenarios.
Promotion of sustainable mobility values, cycling and walking culture as a mean of socialization and re-appropriation of urban spaces. Output: shorts.
Activation of a permanent observatory of the transformation of some areas of the city of Milan: every project team worked on a specific area, focused on it both the phases of documentation and scenarios visualization. This will make possible obtaining a map of the city of Milan in continuous evolution, which could record and make available the different stages of change.
Workshop with citizens, associations and local administration.

Development
After exploring the potentialities of audiovisual storytelling for empowering social conversations and the specific contribution of different audiovisual artifacts and genres and their synergy, the research program develops new activities integrating social media advocacy and transmedia strategies combining co-design processes and participatory video.

Dissemination
General events and publications

Urban Center, Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, Milan:
– Public Screening (12 April-12 May 2011);
– Workshop with associations of citizens, public administration representatives, local institutions (5 May 2011)
European Week of Sustainable Mobility, 16-22 September 2009: Award Ceremony. Jury: Assessore Croci (Mobility, Transport and Environment Sector), l’Ing. Riazzola (Mobility, Transport and Environment Sector), il dottor Galli (Fiab – Ciclobby), Prof. Barbella.
Public screening in Piazza del Duomo;
Online publication on LaRepubblica;
Online publication on Muoviti Sostenibile;
Online publication on XCITTA’.
International Design Festival Saint-Etienne 2010 (France) – La mobilité dans la ville et son imaginaire / City mobility and its imaginary representation (www.citedudesign.com);
Salone del Mobile 2010: That’s Design – Zona Tortona and Green Island 2010. Il frutteto urbano, a project by aMAZElab Milano.

Academic events and publications

DES – Service Design Centre. Services for Mobility, 3 February 2010, Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento INDACO. Presentation of the Design Research activity “Strategies and communication formats for sustainable mobility in Milan”.
Sustainability in Design: Now! LeNS Conference, 29 September – 1 October 2010, Bangalore, India, Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology. Presentation of results for the first research phase.
Culture and the Making of Worlds. ESA Research Network Sociology of Culture Midterm Conference, 7-9 Ottobre 2010, Università Bocconi. Presentation of results.
Online publication on Scuola del Design

Tools

Walking Milan
Type of tool: video (video-interviews; live action; animation)

Function: analysis, documentation, representation of future scenarios, promotion of values of sustainable living and moving.

Origin: internal production by students of Master Degree in Communication Design (School of Design); footage from Storie Digitali digital archive.

Target/audience: external target: citizens and city council.

Street Tales
Type of tool: video, photography, audio footage, sketches and pictures.

Function: iconographic research, urban exploration

Origin: internal production by students of Master Degree in Communication Design (School of Design); footage from Storie Digitali digital archive.

Target/audience: internal target: other students, teachers, researchers.

The Changing City

• Type of tool: audio effects, music and sounds (public domain); voice over

• Function: storytelling (voice over and interviews), representation of urban environment, soundtrack

Bibliography

Galbiati M., Piredda F. (2012). Visioni urbane. Narrazioni per il design della città sostenibile, Milano: FrancoAngeli.

Galbiati M., Bertolotti E., Mattana W., Piredda F. (2010). ‘Envisioning the City: A Design- Oriented Communication Process for a Sustainable Urban Transformation’. Culture and the Making of Worlds. ESA Research Network Sociology of Culture Midterm Conference,7th–9th October 2010, Bocconi, Milan, www.esaculturebocconi2010.org. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/ abstract=1692118; ISSN: 1556-5068

Galbiati M., Bertolotti E., Mattana W., Piredda F. (2010). ‘Imagine Milan: Storytelling for sustainable city mobility’, in Ceschin F., Vezzoli C. and Zhang J. (edited by), Sustainability in Design: Now! Challenges and Opportunities for Design Research, Education and Practice in the XXI Century, Proceedings of the LeNS Conference, Bangalore, India 29th September to 1st October 2010, Volume II, pp. 981-992. ISBN- 13: 978-1-906093-55-6 [Volume I, ISBN-13: 978-1-906093-54-9] (www.lensconference.polimi.it)

Ciancia, M., Piredda, F., Venditti, S. (2014). “Shaping and Sharing Imagination. Designers and the transformative power of stories,” in H. Moura, R. Sternberg, R. Cunha, C. Queiroz, and M. Zeilinger (eds.), Interactive Narratives, New Media and Social Engagement International Conference, Victoria College, University of Toronto, Canada, Proceedings, Available on Academia.edu