The Project Abito, started in 2019, is a project of clothing exchange and inclusion activities to combat poverty and social exclusion and foster integration, which develops on the districts of the Quadrilateral and Porta Palazzo, marked by multiculturality and very evident social differences.

The project is carried out by the San Vincenzo de Paoli Association in collaboration with the Youth Team of the Green Cross Turin and aims to give greater dignity to people living in conditions of economic or social distress, stimulate participatory dynamics in society, reactivate relational networks, recover and regenerate used clothes.

In fact, Abito involves citizens (supporters, beneficiaries, volunteers) and local authorities, thus including all people who live or use the neighborhood. All the actors involved in the project come into synergy by creating a circular relationship where everyone contributes with their own resources.

The project develops mainly according to three axes:

• The store: where the collection and distribution, through the Social Factory show room, of the clothes donated by the citizens takes place;
• Reciprocity: the persons enrolled in the service can take free clothes and in return give back their time and skills to the service of the community;
• Tailoring: where a part of the clothes that are not distributed become new ethical and sustainable fashion garments. Tailoring therefore also becomes a place of training, inclusion and job opportunities.

The heart of the Abito project is the circularity. The help received through the donation of clothes promotes the integration of people who, in turn, can offer time and skills at the disposal of the community.

One year after opening, about 1000 people joined the service and the impact on the neighborhood was important in terms of promoting volunteering and citizenship activities, thus encouraging the registration of new volunteers.

Collaborations have also been launched with associations in the neighborhood, with a fashion institute and with small businesses.

During the Covid 19 pandemic, the project was successful, thanks to the help of other local organizations, to provide a basic service to all members.

In these months many initiatives have flourished such as:

• Collection of elegant clothes, then made available to anyone who was looking for work and needed a formal dress for an interview;
• Launch of an online platform to foster community actions and volunteering;
• In March ended the first course of tailoring;
• In April, a crowfunding campaign to support tailoring courses has just ended.

“The pandemic has made us much more aware of the impact that our systems of life have on the ecosystem,” says Giorgio Ceste, Project Coordinator.

The goal that Abito aims for the coming months is therefore to start courses and training that include the themes of sustainability together with those of social justice, elements which are closely interlinked and which, in addition to training participants, can also give them employment opportunities.

Watch the new video of the project to learn more.

Progetto Abito is part of the 15 generative welfare projects of Torino Social Factory program of the City of Turin, co-funded by the National Metropolitan City Operational Program and the European Union, European Social Fund, made as part of Torino Social Impact.

For more information on the Torino Social Factory program and the other 14 projects that are part of it go to this link.