Open House Roma 2025 featured 30 buildings, 12 events, and 8 urban guided tours as part of the festival’s programme dedicated to showcasing the Open House Europe annual theme: Future Heritage.

Rome has no shortage of historically significant architecture, so it is no surprise the theme of Future Heritage resonated deeply throughout the city during this year’s festival. Open House Roma 2025 reflected on the many possible meanings of this concept, offering in its programme visits to a wide variety of projects that provided opportunities to reflect on how the city could face transformations capable of generating value for the future.

The importance of environmentally conscious design and the city’s ability to adapt and thrive amidst modern challenges became the main pillars of the festival. The selection included projects in strategic areas that, thanks to recent interventions and after years of waiting, had regained an urban role. It highlighted urban regeneration initiatives carried out with the participation of citizens in the design process, addressing conditions of severe decay. The programme also featured industrial sites converted through design solutions that balanced preservation and progress, alongside historic and archaeological assets enhanced or repurposed in line with the development needs of a city looking toward the future.

La Vela di Calatrava: Between Ambition and Rebirth

Despite being peripheral compared to the other activities and difficult to reach, the Vela di Calatrava attracted great public interest, with all visiting slots fully booked. Visiting the construction site was an exceptional opportunity to discuss the future of heritage, starting from a building that was supposed to play a central role in the area where it was conceived and is only now regaining a role in the city.

Originally designed as the City of Sport by Santiago Calatrava, it remained unfinished since 2005, becoming a symbol of architectural ambition and neglect. However, the Demanio Agency, owner of the area since 2021, has launched an important project for the Jubilee 2025 to complete the Palasport, develop a park, and provide services. After 20 years, this abandoned monumental structure is being made accessible to citizens, initiating a process of regeneration for the area, which still awaits further intervention to complete the second phase of the project, currently under study. These tours were hugely successful, reminding visitors that reuse and transformation offer sustainable ways to engage with a highly complex heritage.

Porto Fluviale Rec House

In addressing the theme of Future Heritage, several key urban regeneration initiatives stood out, such as the long-awaited Porto Fluviale Rec House—the restoration of the former Magazzini Directorate of the Commissariat in Rome. This project will transform a historically protected building, long occupied, into public housing and community service spaces, with a strong focus on social inclusion.

The restoration carefully enhances the building’s historical character, removing incongruous additions to restore spatial coherence while combining preservation with adaptation. The intervention emerges from a collaborative, multidisciplinary approach, thoughtfully balancing respect for memory with contemporary use. The different needs will find a balance, giving the city a space for community interaction and neighbourhood development.

Horti Sallustiani

When dealing with the theme of Future Heritage in Rome, one cannot avoid considering the inestimable historical heritage that needs to be protected and enhanced in accordance with the development needs of a city that looks to the future. This resonated clearly at the Horti Sallustiani, the monumental gardens of the Roman nobility built by Caesar in 70 BC and brought to their peak by the historian Sallustius.

Buried in 1870 during the construction of the modern district, they lie about 14 metres below the current street level. Restored in the 1990s, they now host concerts, conferences, and events, preserving their historical value, and are open to the public only on private occasions. Visiting these exceptional spaces offered visitors a moment of connection across time and memory and an opportunity to reflect on the importance of active heritage conservation—allowing for compatible reuse without compromising its value.

Beyond the architectural tours, the festival enriched the dialogue through engaging events. The inaugural conference was held at Villa Aurelia, a 17th-century building in the heart of Gianicolo Hill, where the theme Future Heritage was explored through a lecture by Dr. Beniamino de’ Liguori Carino on Adriano Olivetti’s ideas in architecture and urban planning. Furthermore, the theme dedicated a special space to children and their families. Workshops explored ecological design, object reuse, and design processes inspired by the protection of the planet. Through play and walks, participants were encouraged to reflect on urban and living spaces, imagining a more liveable and welcoming city for everyone.