International
Film
Festival

1971
Locarno, TI

The International Film Festival in Locarno is held every year in August. The screenings take place inside movie theatres during the day and in the Piazza Grande square in the evening. 

At the end of the ‘60s, the International Film Festival was coming to its end because permission had been denied for screenings in the Grand Hotel park, where the festival usually took place. The only spaces left were movie theatres.
In 1974, a special committee asked Livio Vacchini to find out a technical solution and the idea of the Piazza Grande arouse: an open, large city theatre, surrounded by the buildings of the square, whose open side (towards the lake) was defined by the tall and large screen.

This screen is a reticular metal structure, a 3D element placed at the entrance of Piazza Grande, in front of the Postal office building, also created by Vacchini. It is supported by foundation pylons sunk down to 9m below the lake level.
The projection booth is composed of 2 prefabricated, superposed fibreglass concave elements.