STOP DESIGNING ROOFTOP SQUARES. START DESIGNING A CITY OF COURTYARDS

Too many “iconic” projects move squares and courtyards to rooftops or inside private buildings.

Spaces that are:

🚫 Hard to reach

🚫 Often semi‑private

🚫 Disconnected from daily life

They look spectacular in photos.

But irrelevant for real urban life.

✅ Real courtyards are different:

🌿 Public or semi‑public

🏃‍♀️ Accessible, permeable, lived in

🌳 Shade, trees, biodiversity

👨‍👩‍👧 Places for connection, play, care

1️⃣ The value of courtyards

A well‑designed courtyard is not a void.

It’s a microclimate.

It’s a place of connection.

It’s a threshold between public and private.

2️⃣ Types of courtyards

🔶 Neighborhood courtyards – semi‑public, between residential blocks

🟥 Urban courtyards – protected squares, porous and vibrant

🟩 Natural courtyards – green rooms inside parks and gardens

3️⃣ The city as a system of courtyards

• Aggregate blocks into living, accessible systems

• Link courtyards with green corridors and slow mobility

• Protect them from car traffic (like Buchanan’s “urban rooms”)

• Treat them as climatic and social infrastructure — not leftover spaces

🌿 Designing the city for courtyards is not just good urbanism.

It’s part of a bigger principle:

Urban nature is not a decoration — it’s a structure.

Courtyards are where nature, climate, and community meet at the heart of the city.

They’re not add‑ons.

They’re the operating system.

📘 For a deeper dive into this principle, read my publication:

https://www.francescoprocacci.com/product-page/urban-nature-is-not-a-decoration