On the Infobuild website, an article by Claudia Capperucci titled “Compact City vs. Sprawling City: Toward the Emergence of the Hybrid Model” presents as a case study the Metropolitan Constellation conceived by Stefano Boeri Architetti for the city of Geneva.
The climate crisis demands a radical rethinking of the very idea of the metropolis. To counter the uncontrolled expansion that has degraded many European territories, the city must return to engaging with the environment: recovering abandoned villages and restoring a direct relationship with nature becomes essential.
From this vision comes the project for Geneva by Stefano Boeri Architetti, envisioned as an “archipelago metropolis” organized around the Salève massif, where different urban nuclei—autonomous yet interconnected—coexist like islands linked by a common network.
At the center is no longer the city, but the mountain, a symbol of biodiversity and of a new coexistence between human and non-human life. The constellation includes eleven centers, among them Geneva and Annecy, and aims to accommodate around 350,000 new inhabitants by 2050, promoting an ecological transition on a transnational scale. The territory is structured as a mosaic of urban, agricultural, and forest areas, where nature becomes an integral part of everyday life. The project is based on energy self-sufficiency, reforestation, and a circular economy, with a predominant use of local wood, processed through short supply chains and reused over time. The goal is to build a sustainable and autonomous system capable of regenerating itself.
To read the full article: https://www.infobuild.it/approfondimenti/citta-ibrida-sfide-ambientali/