Creative adaptive reuse of cultural heritage for urban regeneration

The creative and collaborative cultural production is a strategical focus in the European political agenda. Culture is as a pillar for sustainable development, able to generate both economic and social values (CHCfE consortium, 2015). Community, cooperation, creativity are also the keywords of several bottom-up experiences in which cultural and creative productions are the drivers of adaptive reuse, with impacts in terms of socio-cultural empowerment and territorial improvement. In Italy, many cases highlight these relationships among built heritage, cultural production, and social innovation, evidencing the need of a systemic approach to adaptive reuse, able to make together built, cultural, social and economic components in order to trigger new local development. Starting from the analysis of these initiatives, the paper highlights some questions that can also represent the main challenges for success and sustainability. Have been the initiatives able to interpret and to answer to local demands for economic, cultural and social services? Have alliances, partnership and financial support transformed informal initiatives into economically viable activities? How management decisions and activities could find solutions to turn new ideas into successful services?