A Venetian tale: Venice's altanas, or the story of a bottom-up phenomenon that became a city icon. 🏛️ Defining which elements constitute a city's beauty — what is part of its character and what is not — remains as important as it is subjective. This question was probably raised in post-renaissance Venice as Venetians started to witness the construction of ad-hoc wooden structures floating on the ocean of existing orange-tiled roofs. Built by inhabitants to access fresh air and outdoor space in a city that had become increasingly jammed, these structures were pragmatic answers to new urban problems. 🌱 One could argue that altanas have nothing Venetian. They are non-ornamental wooden structures in a city covered in intricately crafted stones. Plugged haphazardly onto existing roofs, they inevitably transform the skyline's character. Nevertheless, as one wanders in Venice today, these anarchic structures have now been entirely swallowed in the aesthetic and charm of the city after centuries of cohabitation between "ad-hoc" and "planned." Altanas are living proofs that the character of a place is never frozen in time: people gradually decide how a city transforms and adapts. And then, progressively and inevitably, what used to be novel becomes the norm. 🌏 As European climates change drastically, triggering unprecedented urban problems, these questions remain: what elements should we value? As our cities need unparalleled transformations to continue sheltering their inhabitants in a drastically different climate, which of the adaptations we pursue today will be deemed beautiful tomorrow?