Numero Zero is a cohousing project in Turin, Italy, located in the Porta Palazzo district at Via Cottolengo 4.2 The project was initiated by the CoAbitare cultural association, which promotes collaborative housing and more socially oriented forms of living at neighbourhood and city level.23 The development was implemented through the Numero Zero residents’ building cooperative, established to purchase and renovate the property; the cooperative was later dissolved after the refurbished dwellings were assigned to individual members.9
The project began in 2009 and has been inhabited since 2013. It comprises eight private apartments for 17 residents, including two children, organised into eight households. The building occupies a 440-square-metre site and contains approximately 750 square metres of residential space, around 200 square metres of indoor and outdoor communal areas, and approximately 180 square metres of commercial premises.
The communal facilities include a ground-floor living room with a kitchen and wood-fired oven, a do-it-yourself workshop, a multipurpose basement room, a cellar, laundry and drying areas, a garden, and a large terrace. The project combines private housing with shared facilities and activities intended to support mutual assistance, participation, and engagement with the surrounding neighbourhood.29
Numero Zero is housed in an early nineteenth-century building whose renovation was subject to municipal planning and building regulations. The works included internal insulation, reconstruction of the roof using laminated timber and wood fibre insulation, and installation of high-performance wooden windows. Heating is supplied by a central condensing gas boiler connected to low-temperature underfloor heating, while six solar thermal panels contribute to domestic hot-water production. Financing came from members’ resources and a loan contracted by the cooperative with Banca Etica.