Sixty years after the construction, Monte Amiata Housing is still a pilgrimage destination from whom have recognized an architectural reference in the Milanese experiment of Gallaretese.

The Portuguese photographer Karina Castro stepped into the building design in 1967 by Carlo Aymonino as she was one of the dwellers. With a synesthetic walk through the housing blocks, she visually captures the complex design of forms and colors of this modern masterpiece.

Built of the flat land on the north outskirt of Milan, Monte Amiata Housing was imagined by Aymonino as an urban microcosmos converging in the metaphysical scenography of three squares and the outdoor amphitheater.
Interpreting the designs by Le Corbusier and Project X for the contemporary cities of the 50s, Aymonino creates a fragmented functional system of blocks not regarding the non-present surroundings.
Breaking the traditional conception of the private housing block, Monte Amiata Housing became a reference for the later Italian residential architecture.

In 1956, the adoption of the new Milan master plan set the stage for the development of new satellite communities around the historical core of the city, which would each house between 50,000 to 130,000 people.
The 'Gallaratese' was one of the residential communities realized in the framework of the Piano di Zona draft in 1963. Split into two parts designed one after the other, the latter was owned by the Monte Amiata Società Mineraria per Azioni. Carlo Aymonino, at the time partner of Studio Ayde, was appointed to the design in 1967 and soon invited Aldo Rossi to design a building for the complex.