ScartiAmo HUB
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Project Title
Full project title
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Project Description
ScartiAmo HUB: from a space to a place
ScartiAmo HUB is coming to life in a suburban ex-elementary school, currently semi-abandoned and not perceived by the local community as a common good. Activities will include (I) outdoor and indoor workshops for kids and adolescents, (II) recycling and donation of furniture and clothing, clothes sewing and upcycling, (III) multi-purpose areas to be shared with other associations, (IV) areas available for initiatives proposed by the local community.
Geographical Scope
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Urban or rural issues
Physical or other transformations
EU Programme or fund
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Description of the project
Summary
ScartiAmo HUB
ScartiAmo HUB is coming to life in a suburban ex-elementary school (via Cervese 4303, 47521 Cesena-FC), currently semi-abandoned and not perceived by the local community as a common good. Our no-profit association - ScartiAmo odv - has obtained on 01/01/2022 the management of this space and aims to transform it in a reference point for integral ecology: educating to co-responsibility among humans towards nature and other human beings.
Activities will include:
EDUCATION
- outdoor activities in a permaculture-designed educational garden and a greenhouse, educating kids to collective responsibility towards Mother Earth
- indoor workshops aimed at stimulating creativity and freedom of expression through art and movement, children's literature, manual workshops
SUPPORTIVE and CREATIVE RECYCLING
- headquarters of our "Mantello di San Martino", which is a "free shop" for clothing and furniture, open to anyone but a reference point for low-income families. Built on the work of 20+ volunteers, here anyone can donate what is no more needed for the others, who get it for free
- "DarnòvLAB" ("d'arnòv" means something which is re-made, from Cesena's dialect) is a sewing lab where old clothes from "Mantello di San Martino" are transformed into unique items, later sold in our second-hand shop (“D’arnòv_recuperiamo bellezza”, via Giovanni XXII 3-5, 47521 Cesena – FC). The lab counts on the voluntary help of elderly women, who find here a space for sharing quality time
A PLACE SHARED BY NO-PROFIT ENTITIES
Part of the building is shared with other associations, which can here carry on their own activities: ENS (National Entity for Deaf People - guidance to local services, sign language courses), Il Trifoglio (exercise for elderlies, yoga, language classes)
A SPACE FOR LOCAL COMMUNITY
Part of the building and the garden will be available for the local community to organize meetings, events, cultural, social, educational initiatives
Key objectives for sustainability
1) Educating to co-responsibility towards nature
We believe that collective responsibility towards nature is something to be learnt since early age. Through workshops with kids and adolescents, we will build a permaculture-inspired educational garden and a greenhouse. We will learn how to design and take care of a resilient and sustainable system that satisfies the necessities of both nature and humans, how to derive livelihood from nature by respecting it and what co-responsibility means.
2) Promoting sharing economy and gratuitousness
In an economic system that has produced and keeps producing way more than what is needed, at the expenses of the environment, free sharing is a revolutionary act that leads to decrease production of goods and to guarantee dignity of people with lower economic incomes. At "Mantello di San Martino" we store big quantities of furniture, household items, and, especially, clothes. This space has encouraged the local community members to donate what they do not need anymore - instead of throwing it away - and freely get what they need, instead of buying it. It is active since 2009, currently located on a different site but soon-to-be moved at ScartiAmoHUB.
3) Fostering circularity through creative recycling
Not everything can be simply re-used as it is: especially with clothes, it often happens that changes in fashion styles make things quickly outdated. However, old clothes can be upcycled and fabrics and other materials can be re-used to create something new. This is what we do at our D'arnòvLAB: we give a second life to clothes and sell them at our shop “D’arnòv_recuperiamo bellezza”-opened in oct2021, to foster circular thinking among local citizens.
What is exemplary in this project is the idea that care for the environment is meaningless without care among humans: here we give a second life to material waste, we learn co-responsibility towards nature and people, we welcome and support the ones society considers as scrap.
Key objectives for aesthetics and quality
1) Creating a welcoming and nice hub for local community
We want ScartiAmo HUB to be a place available for locals to carry on their own activities. We want to offer locals a space where they can come together to organise events, celebrations and meetings, or where they can carry out social, cultural or artistic initiatives open to the public. To make this possible, we will furnish one of the two main rooms on the ground floor with functional and nicely designed items, from second-hand chains or sustainably produced with natural materials. Also part of the garden will be equipped: shading structures will be naturally produced with willow cuttings and equipped with second hand or sustainably produced furniture. We want this area to be a meeting space for people from various social and economic backgrounds, therefore its lease will always be at necessary minimum.
2) Making sharing economy attractive among all community members
What we often see in the headquarters of social projects is a general state of abandonment and mess, resulting in a sense of lack of dignity that affects users too. This is the consequence of improper funds, time and workforce, and what sadly happens where our "Mantello di San Martino" currently is. What we want to create here is a space where second hand clothes, furnitures and items are stored and nicely presented to users, who can see what we offer and pick what they need as in a proper shop. We hope that a captivating style will attract also locals from various social backgrounds and not only low-income families, to spread sharing attitudes among more and more people.
By designing a nice and welcoming place, which gathers local community members from very different social and economic backgrounds, we want to fight segregation of certain groups and the incapacity of others to get to know what they consider "distant". We want people to put themselves in others' shoes, literally and metaphorically, by enjoying the same nicely designed place.
Key objectives for inclusion
1) Ensuring social engagement in daily life
Thanks to the help of various volunteers, we make sure that most vulnerable people or low-income families are not excluded from social dynamics: we assist them by helping kids with homework or baby-sitting them while parents are at work. We also spend time with elderly women and involve them in our initiatives, especially at D'arnòvLAB, where they can enjoy quality time together while being creative. Moreover, we organise volunteering activities for groups of young people who have approached us: young people are the ones who suffered the most due to the pandemic and consequent isolation, and schools are often incapable to provide in-person activities. With us, they engage in storing items at Mantello di San Martino and preparing them to be donated, they help with maintenance of spaces and spend time in our shop to learn how it works.
2) Training for inclusion on the workplace
Moreover, at our shop "D'arnòv-recuperiamo bellezza" we welcome trainees from professional institutes and the social services, mainly adolescents coming from situations of violence, drug abuse, early school leaving. We welcome students or young people who could not carry on a working experience at ordinary businesses, due to physical or mental handicaps, or behavioural disorders. According to specific needs and interests, we train them to work in a shop and basic sewing competences.
What is exemplary is that we do not work for people, but with people: the ones who participate in our activities to avoid social exclusion or isolation are not passive beneficiaries of charitable schemes, but they become providers of precious help. Parents of kids who get helped with homework are the volunteers of Mantello di San Martino, elderly sewers are extraordinary teachers and the young volunteers and trainees are fundamental to make the project running. Again, it's all about sharing, everyone counts.
Physical or other transformations
Innovative character
The three keywords of our project are circularity, community feeling and beauty, meaning that we want to promote a sense of co-responsibility towards nature and other humans and we want to do it together as a community - no-one excluded-, as we believe that this is the deep meaning of beauty. We think that fostering beauty all around us means being able to see the hidden potential in what society considers "scrap", from things to people. In this sense, a deep concept of beauty is what combines the environmental dimension with the social dimension: beauty means recycling materials and give them a second life as the planet needs it, working with people, pull out their qualities and making them feel essential, as our society needs it.
In our activities - Mantello di San Martino, D'arnòv-recuperiamo bellezza and D'arnòvLAB, workshops fior kids and adolescents - there is no separation between donors and beneficiaries, but everyone is welcome to contribute with what she/he can give and at the same time enjoy our services. This way people get together, feel essential for the well-functioning of their community, and put in place processes that promote environmental sustainability.
Our approach is exemplary as it considers that co-responsibility towards nature and towards each-other are the same thing, and being driven by a deep sense of beauty is what puts it in place.
