CityLife

The SITES Platinum certified CityLife represents the first SITES-certified project in Europe, and the first project to achieve SITES for Existing Landscapes certification.

CityLife represents one of the most important urban regeneration projects in Europe, born on the occasion of EXPO 2015. It features a well-planned, balanced mix of public and private functions, including residential units, offices, shopping, services, green areas, and public spaces, making it an active neighborhood day and night. It is capable of proposing new models and paths for living, working, and experiencing culture and leisure, creating new liveability values and urban sociality, and equipping the city with a new tool to compete with other European realities.

The complex is configured as a sum of iconic buildings signed by famous architects in modern architecture: Generali Tower by Zaha Hadid, Allianz Tower by Arata Isozaki, and finally PWC Tower, designed by Daniel Libeskind. In addition, the district will be crowned by the new building designed by Bjarke Ingels Group, CityWave, that will mark the access of CityLife from Via Domodossola. The project involved the creation of a microcosm around these Three Towers and the future CityWave, where the characteristics of the Milanese landscape and its territory are reproduced, a park between the mountains and the plain. The prestige of the CityLife neighborhood is also represented by the perfect balance between city's futuristic revitalization and historical memory, represented by the “Palazzo delle Scintille”, designed by Paolo Vietti Violi in 1923, in a continuous fusion between past, present, and future.

Resources in the CityLife community, from natural to human and technological, are used effectively, equally, and responsibly to meet the community’s current and future needs and priorities. All buildings within the project boundary are characterized by a high technological content, material innovation and energy solutions.

The area is a major urban redevelopment project, reducing soil consumption by renovating already urbanized areas. The large green park, which covers 52% of the total site area, improves the quality of life of its users and counteracts the city's heat island effects, despite having reduced water consumption by 100%. The site and climate conditions allow for solar access during winter and early spring, maximizing solar heat gains, controlling solar access during early autumn, and ensuring sun protection during summer through shading devices and vegetation to protect the building.

Michela Tedeschi, Senior Sustainability Consultant at Manens S.p.A, commented: “Manens has been involved as designer and sustainability consultant for various buildings in the Citylife area for more than a decade. The SITES certification at Platinum level is the latest achievement of the now existing site and plays a crucial role in validating the level of sustainability of the design solutions adopted for the landscape and MEP systems even before SITES was created. The SITES certification holds the power to generate positive global impacts, and the aspiration is for CityLife to serve as a positive model, demonstrating that it is possible to create a project on a remarkable scale with outstanding results in terms of energy and water savings, climate regulation, preservation of native habitats, promotion of soil restoration, and enhancement of vegetative coverage."

Paolo Micucci, CEO at CityLife S.p.A., commented: “The CityLife team has supported the creation of a master plan centered on people's quality of life from the very beginning. Thanks to the innovative idea of burying all the infrastructures underground, it was possible to immerse the buildings in a park of approximately 17 hectares, free from traffic, noise and smog. Today, thanks to this investment, the services offered and the careful management of public spaces, a vast community of visitors has been born, with many people who have identified CityLife as their point of return. All this shows the pleasure of experiencing our neighborhood and represented the yardstick with which these three international certifications rated CityLife at Platinum level.”

Learn more about this project in the USGBC+ article, Europe's first SITES-certified landscape is a green heartbeat in the center of Milan.

Photo credit: Alberto Fanelli