We belong to an animal species capable of inventing ever-new tools and producing artificial devices that rival nature’s own wonders. The role we assign ourselves is that of the protagonist: we lay claim to every territory we cross, shaping the planet according to our desires. Over time, however, we have learned to pay closer attention to other forms of life and to inanimate resources. We have observed the less desirable consequences of our technological abilities, and we have begun to question our own creative talent. Many of us now wish to restrain the force of our impact on Earth – before it turns into overreach. We have understood how unwise it is to saw off the branch that supports our own shelter.
We can rely on our greatest instrument – language – to give voice to this awareness and to coordinate an approach more attuned to the context in which we intervene. This is our burden: to see ourselves generating harm, often without intending to. And this is also our virtue: the ability to use language to make our vision of the future more welcoming to life and resources.
Second Nature is the magazine that Maccaferri dedicates to the “new humans.” The new humans are today’s adults – those who hold the power to act directly on structures and infrastructures, and who are determined to exercise this responsibility with a renewed commitment to balance: between transformative ambition and the preservation of the planet’s natural resources. The new humans are also the generations to come, whom we must consider every time we make critical decisions. Ultimately, this is a matter of design.
It means designing with mastery, to adapt our artefacts to the ongoing changes of our planet – changes that are continuous, hard to predict, and sometimes accelerated by careless action. It also means designing on behalf of those who will succeed us, whose destiny could be compromised by choices that fall short of excellence.
Second Nature uses the most powerful tool available to our species – language – to highlight virtuous projects, encouraging research, and inventive solutions. Case studies, conversations, applications, and construction sites: a bi-weekly appointment dedicated to the new humans. On one side: mindful, capable designers, technicians, experimenters, and scholars. On the other: readers not yet born, to whom each contribution is ultimately addressed.
For 140 years, Maccaferri has worked along this very ridge – the inherent ambiguity of the human condition, where our animal matrix meets our capacity to design. Nature and culture converge rather than collide. Second Nature draws on this unique industrial sensitivity and welcomes dialogue among all parties involved: those who express the need for interventions (every inhabitant of planet Earth), those who envision what must be done (the designers), and those who bring projects to life (the practitioners executing interventions).
Environmental, social, and organizational sustainability can be achieved only by fuelling this dialogue. Second Nature builds on the vast global network of relationships fostered by Maccaferri to animate an extended mind – one that feeds the collective ingenuity of many interlocutors: employees, researchers, public administrators, designers, investors, media, climate-minded citizens, and experts in engineering-based climate adaptation.
It bears repeating: only dialogue among diverse actors can guarantee sustainable choices. This is Second Nature’s mission.
Leonardo Previ – Trivioquadrivio, President
