Vol. 23 No. 2 (2025): Nature, Myth, Design
Nuovi miti / New Myths

Twilight of the myths, or, How to familiarise with urban nature

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  • Manuela Ronci
Manuela Ronci
Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning (DIST), Politecnico di Torino, Italy
DOI: https://doi.org/10.36253/rv-17940

Published 2026-05-08

Keywords

  • Multispecies coexistence,
  • Urban wildness,
  • Friche,
  • Colonisation,
  • Infrastructural heritage,
  • Biological colonisation
    • ...More
    Less

How to Cite

Ronci, M. (2026). Twilight of the myths, or, How to familiarise with urban nature. Ri-Vista. Research for Landscape Architecture, 23(2), 282–305. https://doi.org/10.36253/rv-17940

Copyright (c) 2025 Manuela Ronci

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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Abstract

The consideration of the relationship between city and nature has historically been char-acterised by the latter being alternatively evaluated as an unbreakable, resilient, un-predictable or fragile system. Both attitudes of reverence and mistrust, as much as aestheticising nostalgia, have progressively sharpened the human detachment from nature, which is often idealised, crystallised or bent to urban needs. The article propos-es a reading of Square Sauvage, by the Ceinturama collective, as an example of a con-temporary landscape architecture attitude that is increasingly prone to accommodating forms of wildness in urban open space design. The Parisian project exhibits a distinctive approach that combines and transcends established mythologies, revealing an ordinary nature that is both spontaneous and friendly. This design attitude encourages experi-ence and contact with the non-human realm, endowing it with new dignity and a novel form that is more seductive and welcoming.

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