If you have been to Milan and Turin, especially if you had the chance to visit people in their homes there, you may be familiar with case di ringhiera, those traditional four to six storey-high buidlings, with a court in the middle and balconies running all along their façades. Common and beloved, they are among the most characteristic homes in these two important northern Italian cities, both a symbol of the country’s industrial growth of the early decades of the 1900s.

Indeed, case di ringhiera, or “railing houses,” were once a defining feature of Northern Italy’s urban landscape, particularly in cities like Milan and Turin. Built to accommodate the rapidly growing industrial workforce during the early 20th century, these unique buildings provided affordable housing for the influx of workers migrating from the south of Italy.