Identity architectures and port landscape in Naples. The case of Immacolatella from a local Ellis Island to a part of a new urban hub

Starting by an iconic building of the port of Naples and the entire waterfront of the Gulf of Naples as the Palace of the Immacolatella, the proposed contribution aims to address a reflection on the role that buildings with strong historical identity can assume within the Port of Naples’ area, subject to recent plans and transformations that will affect it in the immediate future; buildings that provide as many opportunities to transform, through well-known restoration efforts, into new, highly connoted and recognizable urban poles that attract visitors and citizens within an area that has for many centuries lived a fate of 'separation' from contemporary city life. The eighteenth-century building of the Immacolatella, wanted by Charles III of Borbone, today in a state of abandonment, is an important sign of permanence in the urban landscape of Naples and represents a valid reference to interpret the transformations of the port area, prospecting ideas for the future. The structure, designed by Domenico Antonio Vaccaro, with an octagonal plan, placed on two levels, is in fact located in the area that until the beginning of the twentieth century was occupied by the Mandracchio, the small commercial port, set up at the beginning of the nineteenth century by Francis I of Borbone. Despite the many transformations made to the building in its two centuries of life, the signs of the original Vaccaro project are now clearly recognizable, as well as the testimonies tha3t the most recent history has left impressed, especially as part of his role as Neapolitan Ellis Island. The proposed contribution, through the reading of archive sources, the analysis of the current state of the factory, the disaster and degradation, and with the tools of the Restoration Project, intends to focus on the identity role that the building can take in the built landscape of Naples, as the fundamental hub of the urban waterfront and an important historical-artistic and anthropological witness of the city.