CAMPO LIBERO (The Innocent House).
Off-Grid Pavilion for the Reactivation of Lands Confiscated from the Mafia.

Campo Libero (The Innocent House) (2016) is a mobile architectural device designed to reactivate agricultural lands confiscated from the mafia in Southern Italy. The project was developed for Libera and presented at the XV Venice Architecture Biennale (Taking Care, Italian Pavilion).

The project takes the form of an off-grid rural pavilion conceived to support Libera, an Italian organization committed to promoting legality through training programs, legal support, and the protection of vulnerable workers, including refugees employed without rights in agricultural contexts.

Rather than functioning as a symbolic monument, Campo Libero is conceived as a spatial apparatus that directly occupies contested land. By overlooking the surrounding fields, the pavilion reclaims the archaic lyricism of the southern countryside while simultaneously asserting a visible and lawful presence in territories historically shaped by illegal control and exploitation.

The structure is designed as an expandable volume. An integrated scaffolding system provides access to the roof and enables the construction of an additional level, allowing the pavilion to adapt to different uses over time. This open-ended configuration supports activities such as training sessions, meetings, accommodation, and agricultural coordination, while maintaining autonomy from centralized infrastructure through off-grid systems.

By operating through occupation rather than representation, Campo Libero anticipates a central dimension later formalized within Epistemic Design: architecture does not merely symbolize political positions, but reorganizes the spatial conditions in which legality and illegality become materially legible.

Displace — The project displaces architecture from representational monumentality to operative occupation, shifting focus from symbolic protest to spatial intervention within contested territories.

Expose — Campo Libero exposes the often-invisible relationship between land, illegality, and exploitation by occupying sites structurally removed from public use. The pavilion renders visible the conflict between legality and criminal control without resorting to didactic or representational devices.

Mediate — The project mediates between institutional frameworks, local communities, and agricultural workers by providing a spatial infrastructure that enables lawful production and collective coordination.

Activate — Campo Libero activates confiscated land by enabling immediate use through occupation, training, and collective presence. Rather than proposing long-term masterplans, the pavilion operates through action: it hosts volunteers, supports agricultural work carried out under legal conditions, and provides a base for social and educational activities. Activation here is operative rather than symbolic.

Through its mobility, off-grid autonomy, and capacity for expansion, Campo Libero constructs a spatial condition in which legality is enacted through presence rather than declared through form.