EUR is a residential area and the major business district in Rome, Italy, part of Municipio IX.

The area was originally chosen in the 1930s as the site for the 1942 World's Fair which Benito Mussolini planned to open to celebrate twenty years of Fascism, the letters EUR standing for Esposizione Universale Roma ("Rome Universal Exposition"). The project was originally called E42 after the year in which the exhibition was to be held. EUR was also designed to direct the expansion of the city towards the south-west and the sea, and to be a new city centre for Rome. The planned exhibition never took place, due to World War II.

Most of the area is the property of EUR S.p.A., a company jointly owned by the Ministry of Economy and the Metropolitan City of Rome Capital.

History

The complex was planned to be home to a World's fair to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the March on Rome and of the beginning of the Fascist era. The autonomous agency responsible for organization and construction of the project, E42 (Esposizione 1942), was created on 26 December 1936.

On 26 April 1937, Benito Mussolini planted a cluster pine at the centre of the site of the future EUR district. Ultimately, he wished to expand the Roman urban area towards the sea.

The general commissioner of the agency, Vittorio Cini, presented a list of the most prominent Italian architects available to Benito Mussolini. The list included Adalberto Libera, Enrico Del Debbio, Giuseppe Terragni, Giovanni Michelucci, Adamius, Eugenio Montuori and Giovanni Muzio. Marcello Piacentini was selected to head the project; the others chosen to contribute included Giuseppe Pagano Pogatschnig, Luigi Piccinato, Luigi Vietti and Ettore Rossi. The first project, on an area of , was presented in 1938.

The name was later changed to EUR, and the final project was presented in 1939. The events of World War II intervened, the Expo failed to take place, and the original project was left uncompleted when the works had to stop in 1942.

After a period of controversy over its architectural and urban planning principles, the project to design EUR was commissioned from the leaders of both of the rival factions in Italian architecture: Marcello Piacentini for the "reactionaries" and Giuseppe Pagano for the "progressives". Each of them brought in their own preferred architects to design individual buildings within the district. EUR offers a large-scale image of how urban Italy might have looked if the Fascist regime had not fallen; wide axially planned streets and austere buildings of either stile Littorio, inspired by ancient Roman architecture, or Rationalism, modern architecture but built using traditional limestone, tuff and marble.

Architecture

250px|right|thumb|[[Museum of Roman Civilization, external colonnade]]

250px|right|thumb|Piazza degli Archivi with [[Archivio Centrale dello Stato]]

The initial project was presented in 1938 under the direction of Marcello Piacentini. The design was inspired, as fascist ideology recommended, by Roman Imperial town planning, (Roman Culture Museum), the Museo Nazionale dell'Alto Medioevo (National Museum of the Middle Ages) and the Museo Nazionale Preistorico Etnografico Luigi Pigorini (Prehistoric Ethnographic Museum). A new planetarium, connected to the Astronomy Museum, opened in 2004.

Economy

thumb|250px|[[Palazzo Eni, inaugurated in 1961]]

EUR is the headquarters of many companies and public bodies, such as Confindustria, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of communications, the Archivio Centrale dello Stato, the Ministry of the Environment, the SIAE, the Agenzia ICE, Eni company, There are a lot of schools in EUR, such as Liceo Scientifico Statale "Stanislao Cannizzaro", Liceo Ginnasio Statale "Francesco Vivona", another one is ITC "Vincenzo Arangio Ruiz". Those three are all public schools; there are also private institutes, such as "Istituto Massimiliano Massimo" and Highlands Institute.

Sport

  • There were three aborted attempts to host a Formula 1 Grand Prix: the first in 1985 as the Grand Prix of Europe/European Grand Prix, then as the Rome GP in 2009 and 2012.
  • In 2018, motor racing championship Formula E held a round on the Circuito Cittadino dell'EUR street track, a course which encompasses the ward. The race was won by Briton Sam Bird. The edition of 2022 was won by Mitch Evans for Jaguar Cars.

The Fascist architecture of EUR was prominently featured in Michelangelo Antonioni's 1962 film L'Eclisse and Bernardo Bertolucci's 1970 film The Conformist. Additionally, multiple buildings were shown in Federico Fellini's films 8½ and Boccaccio '70.

The location was also used as the headquarters of Mayflower Industries in the 1991 movie Hudson Hawk and served as a backdrop for scenes from the 1999 film adaptation of Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus.

The burial of Marco Sciarra in 007's Spectre was filmed at Museum of Roman Civilization.

Fascist architecture

<gallery mode="packed" heights="150px">

File:Eur aereo edit.JPG|Aerial view

File:Potere.jpg|Central Archives of the State

File:EUR - Roma - Palazzo dell'INA e dell'NPS.JPG|Palazzo INA

File:Museo nazionale delle arti e tradizioni popolari in 2018.04.jpg|National Museum of Arts and Popular Traditions

File:Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana a EUR Roma.jpg|Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana

File:Palazzo dei Congressi a EUR Roma.jpg|Palazzo dei Ricevimenti e Congressi

File:Museo della Civiltà Romana a EUR Roma.jpg|Museum of Roman Civilization

File:Basilica dei Santi Pietro e Paolo in 2018.04.jpg|St. Peter and St. Paul Basilica

</gallery>

Post-fascist architecture

<gallery mode="packed" heights="150px">

File:2012-07-19 Roma EUR Fungo (torre serbatoio).jpg|Il Fungo (The Mushroom), 1960

File:Grattacielo Italia - EUR.jpg|Palazzo Italia, 1960

File:Torre Inail.jpg|Palazzo INAIL, 1965

File:Roma EUR sede centrale INPS.jpg|Palazzo INPS, 1967

File:Roma EUR palazzo Poste Italiane.jpg|Palazzo Poste Italiane, 1969–1976

File:EURNUVOLA25082023 105A.jpg|New Convention Center designed by Massimiliano Fuksas, 2016

</gallery>

Park

<gallery mode="packed" heights="150px">

File:2013-04-11 Roma Parco Lago EUR.jpg|Central Lake Park

File:Il complesso delle Poste Italiane all'EUR.JPG|The lake

File:Roma Cascate Laghetto EUR Palazzo dello Sport.jpg|Fountains and PalaLottomatica

</gallery>

EUR during the 1960s

Photos taken by Italian photographer Paolo Monti, showing the district during the 1960s:

<gallery mode="packed" heights="150px">

File:Paolo Monti - Servizio fotografico (Roma, 1967) - BEIC 6349148.jpg

File:Paolo Monti - Servizio fotografico (Roma, 1967) - BEIC 6349155.jpg

File:Paolo Monti - Servizio fotografico (Roma, 1967) - BEIC 6364270.jpg

File:Paolo Monti - Roma Eur 1967 stazione Fermi.jpg

File:Paolo Monti - Servizio fotografico (Roma, 1967) - BEIC 6349154.jpg

</gallery>

See also

  • Euroméditerranée, area with similar characteristics in Marseille
  • 22@Barcelona, area with similar characteristics in Barcelona

References and notes

Bibliography

  • Christine Beese: Marcello Piacentini. Moderner Städtebau in Italien. Berlin 2016, pp.&nbsp;300–329.