International Conference: For the General Public. Architecture Between Debate, Dissemination, and Narrative Strategies.

Politecnico di Milano, December 2-3, 2025.
Organized by Chiara Baglione (Politecnico di Milano) and Fabio Marino (Politecnico di Milano).

Communicating architecture to a non-specialist audience means not only interpreting and clarifying complex ideas but also developing accessible narratives capable of engaging and stimulating. Positioning architecture as a matter of collective relevance, and raising awareness among non-experts about the quality of design, construction, and the urban environment, has required a continuous evolution of narrative strategies over time. In the past, architectural dissemination relied primarily on specialists or on the mediation of intellectuals. Today, however, media have multiplied and diversified, embracing visual, audiovisual, performative, and digital languages.

The conference aims to foster a historically grounded and critically engaged reflection on the impact that the evolution of languages, formats, and communication platforms has had - and continues to have - on the construction of architectural narratives intended for the general public. It seeks to examine case studies and models that reveal processes of transformation, continuity, and emerging challenges in architectural communication, spanning a timeline from the early 20th century to today’s diverse and complex media environment, characterized by a multiplicity of languages and platforms.

This is therefore an invitation for a critical examination of how the relationship between architecture and the general public has transformed and continues to evolve, considering the ways in which architectural narratives and modes of dissemination have been constructed and conveyed across various traditional and digital media.

To participate in the conference please submit an abstract of the proposal in Italian or English,
providing a single PDF file with the following information to general-public-dabcpolimi.it:
- Title
- Author’s information (Name Surname, Institutional affiliation, Email address);
- Short biography (100 words max);
- Keywords (max 5);
- Abstract text (max 300 words);
- Image representative of the proposal;
- Selected bibliography

Deadline for abstract submission: September 20, 2025

Notification of acceptance: September 30, 2025

Selected authors are not required to pay any registration fee. Participation in the conference is free of charge.

For further details on submission see the website: https://sites.google.com/view/conference-general-public-dabc/home