Participatory Processes & Civic Innovation.
Il Verde che Vorrei.
Co-designing urban green spaces in Turin’s neighbourhoods.
From May to November, three neighbourhoods in Turin hosted Il Verde che Vorrei (The Green I’d Like) — a creative and participatory laboratory involving children, teenagers and adults in the co-design of urban green spaces within their own communities.
The project demonstrates how creativity and participatory design can transform urban green spaces into places of sociality, play and collective wellbeing — starting from the desires and visions of the people who inhabit those neighbourhoods every day.
In each session, participants explored their neighbourhood, imagined their ideal green space, and translated desires and emotions into maps, collages and micro-prototypes, using creative reuse materials provided by Remida Torino (Creative Reuse Center): recovered wallpaper, fabrics, ribbons, ropes, egg cartons, small sticks and buttons. Discarded objects transformed into concrete tools for collectively shaping the future of urban public spaces.
The three workshops
San Salvario Neighbourhood
24 May · “San Salvario has a green heart” festival
During the neighbourhood festival, children and adults transformed posters, threads, markers and post-it notes into representations of flexible and inclusive spaces. Ideas that emerged included artistic signage, sensory corners with scented plants, and messages like “less asphalt, more grass”.
Green space was perceived as a place for play, relaxation and sociality — but also as a resource to be cared for and collectively valued, a first signal of the demand for urban regeneration emerging directly from citizens.
Aurora Neighbourhood
16 September · Cecchi Point community hub
At the Cecchi Point neighbourhood hub in Aurora, the workshop primarily involved women with children. Following an exploratory walk through the Pellegrino Garden, participants created micro-prototypes of ideal spaces featuring hammocks, sand areas, small ponds and play corners for adults.
The group work highlighted the importance of urban green for intergenerational cohesion, demonstrating how participatory design can strengthen community bonds and everyday wellbeing in urban neighbourhoods.
Parella Neighbourhood
8 November · Via Carrera urban garden
During the neighbourhood chestnut festival, children and adults co-created a large poster using reuse materials, imagining aromatic pathways, benches and winter coverings to make the urban green space liveable throughout the year.
The workshop stimulated reflection on shared use, recreational activities and the identity of space — strengthening the sense of care and collective responsibility towards urban commons.
Why Il Verde che Vorrei is a model for urban co-design
Each session demonstrated that urban sustainability grows from the direct involvement of citizens and the valorisation of small creative gestures. Transforming waste materials into design tools is not simply a creative exercise — it is a concrete way of educating people towards the care of public space and building a culture of grassroots urban regeneration.
The project showed that green space is not just nature — it is a catalyst for sociality, play, wellbeing and collective responsibility. And that when people of all ages come together to imagine, ideas emerge that no one could have developed alone.