“COCOON” Childcare Centre Z.I.P. In Padova | FONTANAtelier global architecture

Commissioned by the Consorzio Zona Industriale e Porto Fluviale di Padova, the Childcare Centre is intended to meet the needs of the workers employed in the area. Open twelve months a year, it provides care for children from three months to six years old. The Consorzio intended the Centre to be unsurpassed in the care it provides for young children. In effect, the scheme was to be a ground-breaking one in a number of ways. Embodying innovations in facilities and pedagogical approach, it was to comprise numerous architectural features involving energy saving, the use of eco-compatible materials and reliance on renewable sources of energy. These requirements had been fully satisfied by Luisa Fontana with engineering work by Arup. The end-result is a complex envisaged as a multi-cellular organism, made up of “cocoon” shaped classrooms that are linked by a space that houses all the necessary service and sanitary facilities. An ergonomic and stimulating space, the Centre is thus “to measure of the child”, with extensive green spaces being a characteristic features.