Do any buildings in Rome resemble American buildings? If so, why?
Do any buildings in Rome resemble American buildings? If so, why? Sure, and that’s because contemporary architecture is mostly globalized, with the same architects working in Rome, London, New York, Shanghai, Lagos, etc.
This is the EUR neighborhood in Rome, which was built starting from the 1930’s, so it’s all contemporary architecture. Including the Euro sky Tower here below. What you will not find anywhere in Italy (nor in the rest of Europe, I believe) is the quintessential US suburban neighborhood:
Italy is a compact country packing 60 million inhabitants in 300,000 square kilometers. That is twice the population of Texas in the same area as Arizona (which is less than half of Texas by surface). Except a good half of the Italian territory is mountains, so not a lot of people can live there. The US has a population density of 35 people per square kilometer in average (yes, I know, it’s an average!), Italy has a population density of 135 people per square kilometer.
Rome has a population of 2.75 million inhabitants. That is approximately the size of Chicago and it’s about twice the surface, but around a third of that surface is not inhabited (it’s parks and agricultural areas), so the density in the urban areas is around the 75% of Chicago’s. You can expect Rome to have an urbanization more similar to Chicago (the urban area of Chicago), not similar to a US suburb.
Rome has tall multi-story houses with anywhere from a handful to a few hundred inhabitants, and several smaller 2–3 story buildings where 2–4 families live. The density is kept low by the parks, but the inhabited areas are quite packed, although not as packed as in Milan.
Another substantial difference is that in Italy everything is made out of masonry or reinforced concrete. Even the skyscrapers tend to have a steel frame, like most international skyscrapers, but the inner partitions are made of masonry, not of wood and drywall panels.
In other words, constructions made like here above in Italy are extremely rare. You may have a drywall partition in an office, or as an improvised solution to split a large bedroom in two for two grown up siblings, but normally the partitions are made with bricks like here below:
