Prelios Integra CEO Nicolò Tarantino: “FICO is a perfect example of Project Management”
The future hotel of FICO Eataly World has been presented – on May 10 at the Innovation Campus in Peschiera Borromeo – at Progetti d'Italia, “the first post-crisis event for the real estate sector, where operators can share views on a concrete and forward-looking basis,” in the words of Guglielmo Pelliccioli, founder of Il Quotidiano Immobiliare which promoted the initiative.
More than five hundred architects, engineers, investors, entrepreneurs, providers and real estate operators attended the event.
For the Prelios Group, Prelios Integra CEO Nicolò Tarantino illustrated the development of FICO Eataly World, on which Integra was responsible for Project Management from the initial work on the former CAAB site in Bologna until the opening in November 2017. Integra will also coordinate the second development phase for FICO, a flagship project for the whole Prelios Group, since the financial structure was created and managed by Prelios SGR working with the PAI Parchi Agroalimentari Italiani Fund.
The success of FICO Eataly World is reflected not only in the number of visitors and revenues reported to date, but also in the international interest the project has attracted, leading to its victory at the MIPIM Awards in Cannes in March this year.
FICO, said Nicolò Tarantino, is a perfect example of Project Management: “Integra coordinated around eighty fitters, with peaks of two hundred and fifty people at the construction site, a site team consisting of ten professionals, a team of four safety coordinators, five works managers and two site managers.” Construction times were exemplary too: "from six months for the executive project to just eighteen months for the conversion of the old CAAB building into today’s FICO complex.”
A second philological redevelopment, true to the tradition and spirit of the site – the Bologna flower and plant market – will constitute the next step of the FICO Eataly World project, which Nicolò Tarantino also illustrated at Progetti d'Italia: the construction of the hotel, located about 150 meters from FICO, with a surface area of more than 11,000 sq.m.
Prelios Integra has already been engaged as the Project Manager on the new development for the world’s largest food and agriculture park.
Once the old home of the flower and plant market has been converted into a “four-star-plus” hotel, it will have a function “complementary to and integrated with the world’s largest food and agriculture park,” said the Prelios Integra CEO, “expanding its hospitality offer and so enhancing its potential as a tourist attraction.”
The project for the hotel designed by architects Iosa Ghini Associati is based on total eco-sustainability for both the building and the interiors, and envisages 200 bedrooms, meeting and conference rooms, a breakfast area and cafeteria, a reception area, offices, two swimming pools, a fitness center and a spa.
“The interiors will have an environmental profile to give the hotel an eco-friendly atmosphere,” explained Nicolò Tarantino. “It will use a high percentage of recycled, hard-wearing, low-maintenance materials. The outdoor area will have a garden and landscaping, and in addition to solar energy the location will have a heating system powered by thermal energy and a high-efficiency photovoltaic plant to guarantee autonomy.”
The bedrooms have been designed to ensure a high level of comfort, and the public areas will ensure guests feel completely at home with smart spaces where they will be able to work, read, eat and meet up with friends.
The project timetable envisages three months for the final plans, three months for the executive plans, 15 months for construction. The hotel is due to open to the public by the end of 2019.