{"id":312,"date":"2020-08-11T01:06:00","date_gmt":"2020-08-11T01:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/enlightenment-demo.onedesigns.com\/blog\/?p=312"},"modified":"2020-10-08T09:17:02","modified_gmt":"2020-10-08T09:17:02","slug":"leonardo-da-vinci-designed-an-ideal-city-that-was-centuries-ahead-of-its-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/enlightenment-demo.onedesigns.com\/blog\/2020\/08\/11\/leonardo-da-vinci-designed-an-ideal-city-that-was-centuries-ahead-of-its-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Leonardo da Vinci designed an ideal city that was centuries ahead of its time"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The word \u201cgenius\u201d is universally associated with the name of Leonardo da Vinci \u2013 a true Renaissance man, he embodied scientific spirit, artistic talent and humanist sensibilities. Exactly 500 years<\/a> have passed since Leonardo died in his home at Ch\u00e2teau du Clos Luc\u00e9, outside Tours, France. Yet far from fading to insignificance, his thinking has carried down the centuries \u2013 and still surprises today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Renaissance marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity, after the spread of the plague caused a global crisis resulting in some 200m deaths<\/a> across Europe and Asia. Today, the world is on the cusp of a climate crisis, which is predicted<\/a> to cause widespread displacement, extinctions and death, if left unaddressed. Then, as now, radical solutions were called for to revolutionise the way people live and safeguard humanity against catastrophe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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Ferrara, Italy bears some resemblance to da Vinci\u2019s design<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Around 1486 \u2013 after a pestilence that killed half the population<\/a> in Milan \u2013 Leonardo turned his thoughts to urban planning problems. Following a typical Renaissance trend, he began to work out an \u201cideal city\u201d project, which \u2013 due to its excessive costs \u2013 would remain unfulfilled. Yet given that unsustainable urban models are a key cause<\/a> of global climate change today, it\u2019s only natural to wonder how Leonardo might have changed the shape of modern cities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The birth of urbanism<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Although the Renaissance is renown as an era of incredible progress in art and architecture, it\u2019s rarely noted that the 15th century also marked the birth of urbanism as true discipline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Palmanova, a Renaissance star fort town in north eastern Italy. Wikimedia Commons.<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The rigour and method behind the conscious conception of a city had been largely missing in Western thought until the moment when prominent Renaissance men pushed forward large-scale urban projects, such as the reconfiguration of Pienza<\/a>, the expansion of Ferrara<\/a> and the construction of the fort town Palmanova<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These works surely inspired Leonardo\u2019s decision to rethink the design of medieval cities, with their winding and overcrowded streets and with houses piled against one another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Discovering Leonardo\u2019s city<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It is not easy to identify a coordinated vision of Leonardo\u2019s ideal city because of his disordered way of working with notes and sketches. But from sources including the Paris manuscript B<\/a> and the Codex Atlanticus<\/a> \u2013 the largest collection of Leonardo\u2019s papers ever assembled \u2013 a series of innovative thoughts can be reconstructed, regarding the foundation of a new city along the Ticino River, designed for the easy transport of goods and clean urban spaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A page from Manuscript B, featuring da Vinci\u2019s famous mirror writing. Ministero dei beni e delle attivit\u00e0 culturali e del turismo.<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Leonardo wanted a comfortable and spacious city, with well-ordered streets and architecture. He recommended \u201chigh, strong walls\u201d, with \u201ctowers and battlements of all necessary and pleasant beauty\u201d, and felt the place needed \u201cthe sublimity and magnificence of a holy temple\u201d and \u201cthe convenient composition of private homes\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His plans for a \u201cmodern\u201d and \u201crational\u201d city were consistent with Renaissance ideals. But, in keeping with his unconventional personality, Leonardo included several innovations in his urban design. Leonardo wanted the city to be built on several levels, linked with vertical staircases. This design can be seen in today\u2019s high-rise buildings, but was absolutely unconventional at the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, his idea of taking full advantage of the interior spaces by positioning flights of stairs on the outside<\/a> of the buildings wasn\u2019t implemented until the 1920s and 1830s, with the birth of the Modernist movement. While in the upper layers of the city, people could walk undisturbed between elegant palaces and streets, the lower layer was the place for services, trade, transport and industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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