The city of Andria is a populous town in southern Italy, in Puglia, whose economy is traditionally linked to agriculture. This area of ​​Puglia, north of Bari, is made up of densely inhabited centers in which the population has concentrated for centuries, leaving the countryside uninhabited. But in Andria something happens that is not found in other nearby cities. Here country laborers have always commuted between the fields and the poor town houses but, with the end of large landholdings and with the progressive improvement of economic conditions, the country laborers have become small landowners and have gradually achieved an economic well-being that has allowed them to build new, healthier and more comfortable homes for their families.
Then small landowners erected their homes in the outskirt of the city, colonizing the entire countryside surrounding the city and occupying with the building the entire cadastral parcel they owned. This way, the only real facade with balcony and windows is the one that faces the street, while the other sides of the building have been left blind in anticipation of the similar construction - "in adherence" - by the adjacent owner. In Andria, within a hundred meters on foot, one can pass from a very dense urban fabric with no green areas to a vast abandoned countryside scattered throughout by isolated buildings. The urban fabric appears as “pixelated” and the the basic pattern of the city get highlighted: the road and the buildings along it.