Over the last 200 years, the role of the pedestrian in Rome has been increasingly neglected in an effort to make way for vehicular traffic. The construction of the embankments in 1880 amputated
the Tiber River, Rome’s historical lifeline for resources and trade, from the urban environment, eliminating any potential for a symbiotic relationship between the river and city. Additionally, the river embankments created excessive volumes of neglected, ‘dead’ space around the river’s urban edge, creating opportunities for the redensification of the area and a revival of forgotten pedestrian channels between the river and the city.

The Fashion Institute is a proposal for a new academic building on the west end of the Via
Trinitatis, a principle passageway within the intricate system of the eternal city. It serves
as a symbol for the future of contemporary architecture in Rome, and displays a vertical
ecology that is invisible throughout the present city.

The building was conceived as a vehicle for harnessing the multiple urban trajectories existing along the Via Trinitatis. Currrently, there is a clear disconnect topographically between the Lungotevere and the Via Trinitatis, providing no urban connection. The proposed Fashion School introduces an
intermediate plane to negotiate the topograhpical shifts created by the embankment walls of 1880. The plane acts as a linking mechanism, and handles movement through a series of stairs along the site. These stairs highlight the urban system, moving the pedestrian through a public channel into the insititution.