The eleventh edition of ReBuild, the event dedicated to sustainable innovation in the built environment, organised by Riva del Garda Fierecongressi, ended in Riva del Garda. Two days of meetings, conventions, and opportunities for relations that stimulate debate, discussion, and listening among all the players in the various spheres of the construction industry.

At the 2025 edition, on 6 and 7 May in Riva del Garda (Trento, Italy), the pillars for a shared vision of the future of the sector were defined, including integrated transitions, inclusive productivity, artificial intelligence and ESG assessments. More than 80 speakers, 16 conferences, 4 workshops, 30 partner companies, 4 start-ups, 13 national and 8 territorial sponsoring bodies, 17 media partners, 4 scientific partners, the contribution of the Autonomous Province of Trento, and over 600 participants are the salient numbers of REbuild 2025.

Un momento di ReBuild 2025.

At the close of the event, the key points for the drafting of the ‘Manifesto for the Future of Construction’ were announced, the result of ‘a collective intelligence effort at the service of the community’. A Manifesto whose foundations were presented at the close of the event, the result of the work of the workshops and the main ideas that emerged from the meetings.

ReBuild 2025, the first day

The first day started the articulated overview of the challenges and opportunities related to the major drivers of change – ESG, Construction, Materials, Energy and Digital. Conferences and workshops addressed key topics such as housing affordability, digitisation of construction processes, urban equity linked to environmental sustainability, the use of bio-based materials and new energy frontiers, including hydrogen and nuclear, and their possible integration. Particular attention was paid to Positive Energy Districts, the regeneration of existing heritage and the life cycle of materials, with a view to a circular economy and reduction of the environmental footprint, also favoured by the integration of plants and systems within buildings. At the end of the day, the start-ups selected for REbuild 2025 presented innovative solutions focusing on digital technologies and artificial intelligence: tools to optimise furniture design by reducing waste and costs, IoT adaptive lighting systems to improve well-being and energy efficiency, B2B SaaS platforms that automate sourcing and negotiation with suppliers, and AI assistants capable of centralising project data, increasing productivity and return on investment.

ReBuild 2025, the second day

The second day consolidated the reflection on a systemic scale, deepening the theme of measuring sustainability, with a particular focus on the social component of ESG, still little explored but increasingly central. The proceedings opened with a discussion on metrics and strategies for refining assessment tools, continuing with an analysis of collaborative models drawn from the Italian space industry and new policies for the ecological transition. In parallel, the participants investigated the digital evolution in the construction supply chain, the decarbonisation opportunities for citizens and businesses, the applications of Contech in construction sites, and concrete cases of ESG-oriented design.

Also rich in insights was the meeting on ‘urban mining’ and the integration of production cycles, which turned the spotlight on the potential of the circular economy in construction.

‘We have identified the starting points of a Manifesto that is in no way intended to be a marketing tool to spread our ideas,’ explained Alessandra Albarelli, General Manager of Riva del Garda Fierecongressi, ’but rather a set of points that ground what will have to occupy our attention and our work in the coming months in the run-up to REbuild 2026, opening up a debate with the entire Real Estate community and an exchange with politics and institutions. ‘The objective was to identify key topics on which to focus our work, that of the REbuild community and the entire sector, following a principle,’ stressed Ezio Micelli, Chairman of REbuild’s Scientific Committee and Full Professor at the IUAV University of Venice: ’it is a commitment within the REbuild community but also outside it, oriented towards the generation of value and values that underpin a fair, equitable and sustainable transition in its fullest sense. The change in Italian real estate must pass through technology, environmental sensitivity and social inclusion’.

The ReBuild 2025 Manifesto

There are four pillars on which the points of the Manifesto will rest, designed as a proposal for a shared strategic vision to accompany the sector towards more sustainable, innovative and inclusive models.

Integrated transitions

First of all, the need to give transition a declination in the plural: it is economic, energy, social, demographic, sustainable and much more at the same time. It is necessary to relate the different transitions and make them proceed along a single track.

As emerged in the discussions among the participants, there are territories that have different priorities, far removed from the issue of energy efficiency and purely environmental considerations: for example, communities suffering from demographic weakening and depopulation, demand a development that must also take sustainability issues into account, but they need an idea of the future that cannot disregard the peculiarities of the place.

The issue is therefore to consider the priority, in the different transitions, and to construct an idea of development that makes transition a value and not a disvalue.

Productivity for housing inclusion

Secondly, the process of modernising the built environment can no longer be entrusted to generic buzzwords or references to bonuses and other subsidies. The issue of construction productivity must be reconsidered not so much and not only for an instance of economic growth and secure profit for companies. It should be reconsidered as an instrument to democratise access to the primary good of housing, to substantiate the right to housing especially for certain segments of the population with various kinds of fragility. Houses that are, in their market value, commensurate with the possibilities that Italians have in their budget today. Productivity is a way to democratise and make housing accessible, and working on this front becomes an unavoidable issue, as is done in other countries.

AI as a lever of change

Third pillar: AI. A ‘disruptive’ theme of our times, artificial intelligence is a source of concern for many practitioners. In dedicated meetings, however, the question was turned on its head, investigating what AI could really bring into play in the future of the built environment. What emerged strongly was the notion that AI could first and foremost become an exceptionally useful and suitable tool for streamlining and speeding up the complex bureaucratic framework that surrounds, cages and slows down the development of the sector. By restoring efficiency and effectiveness to processes: once the field has been cleared of most of the formal tasks that do not generate value, the players in the supply chain will be able to return to thinking about design in all its dimensions, from the realisation of good projects – decarbonised, accessible, healthy and durable – to the intelligent management of the built heritage, capable of declining transitions.

Social Assessment

Fourth, the topic of ESG, with particular reference to how the Social dimension is assessed. A dimension that has not been adequately worked on, but which is increasingly central in the public debate, among practitioners and on the political tables.
Faced with examples in which communities have clearly appeared more solid and richer, the request to develop a dashboard of indicators that would give back the richness and complexity of the value that is socially given to a new neighbourhood, a new real estate intervention, a transformation, an urban regeneration, has emerged with great prominence. Just as it has been possible to measure positive differences in value for neighbourhoods and buildings endowed with superior energy efficiency, it is now possible and necessary to start thinking that the social dimension is also a value-generating dimension and therefore measurable and to be measured, with a precise unit of reference for those who have to decide whether and how to activate an investment, promote a project or carry out other operations in the area. Having established that, if there is no measurement, there is no possibility of improvement, the issue of the responsibility for the production of the rules of the game, their synthesis and implementation, has opened up. Which in any case cannot be postponed, because no matter how complex the set of rules may be, it is necessary to give numbers and values to the many dimensions of the social that make up, as a whole, the theme of transitions and sustainability in the round.

Unanimous, therefore, is the reference to the concept and declinations of transition, which is a constitutive, and not an accessory, element of the sector’s development. A development that must find in productivity a driving force for the generation of value and access to fundamental rights. A process that can and must be driven by the help of new technologies, whose continuous contamination becomes a bearer of value. A value that can only be expressed in a social dimension in which the issue of transitions and all-round sustainability can be substantiated. The messages that emerged from the REbuild working groups form the basis of a collective commitment that looks to the future, fostering the creation of new entrepreneurial ecosystems and economic and social scenarios. They are the foundations on which the Manifesto will take shape and build its architecture: a document that will be the result of interactions and exchanges of ideas and knowledge by those involved in the world of construction, finance, services and design at different levels and committed on various scales. In the vein of ‘Connecting minds, enabling innovation’.