I mercati coperti a Palermo. Architettura e tecnica nella costruzione in ferro tra Ottocento e Novecento

Abstract

The history of the construction and transformations of the covered iron markets in Palermo, between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, is very interesting for scholars of historical construction techniques and systems and studies - in addition to the evolution, progress and rethinking - also the assumptions economic and social which made it possible to better organize trade within designed buildings. The essay offers some reflections on two covered markets designed by Giuseppe Damiani Almejda in Palermo and representative of that short and fervent Iron Age that was able to combine the needs of local entrepreneurs, who found a promising opportunity for growth in iron processing, and the technical culture of architects and engineers of the time who interpreted the potential of the new material in an innovative way.