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The 23 June is International Women in Engineering Day, a day dedicated to celebrating the work and achievements of female engineers all over the world. 

When we wrote ALUMNAE, we wanted to collect lots of positive examples for current and future femal students of STEM subjects, but also to see how far there is still to go. With the book ALUMNAE, we wanted to do just that: tell the stories of 67 women who graduated in engineering at the Politecnico in order to portray 67 different ways of being an engineer, all united by their expertise and passion for their work. Read it here. 

But today we ask ourselves: who were the women who first had the desire (and also, thinking back to that time, the courage) to undertake an engineering course at the Politecnico di Milano? Three names come to light: Tatiana Wedenison, Gaetanina Calvi and Maria Artini, who paved the way for all the other women who came after them. 

TATIANA WEDENISON – ENGINEERING STUDENT 

It was 1888 and Tatiana Wedenison, born in Milan in 1864 and the daughter of a shopkeeper, enrolled at the Politecnico di Milano. Despite not completing her studies, she was the first woman in Italian history to attempt a degree in engineering. In 1894, Tatiana graduated with a degree in natural sciences. 

GAETANINA CALVI - CIVIL ENGINEERING ALUMNA 

We have to wait until the year 1913 to witness the Politecnico’s first female graduate: Gaetanina Calvi, a civil engineer, was the only woman on her course. There were 156 graduates that year (including 149 engineers). Half a century had passed since the foundation of the Politecnico di Milano (1863). 

Her professional achievements include the design of the new wing of the Institute for the Blind in Milan, originally intended as a retirement home in 1925, in which she was involved personally, working with the architect Faravelli. In the following years, she taught mathematics and science at this same institute, which only began to give her monetary compensation in 1928 (source). 

Our Engineering Alumnus Longoni (Chemical Engineering 1968) remembers her: 

“I met Gaetanina Calvi (known at the time as Countess Calvi) in Costa Lambro (a district of Carate Brianza) where she lived. I had just enrolled at the Liceo Zucch in Monza and my father sent me to have maths lessons with the Countess at her home in Costa Lambro. She was strict, but very devoted to helping the children she taught. […] Countess Calvi taught mathematics but also Latin and Italian to many of us children of farmers or labourers who mostly worked in the spinning mills along the River Lambro. Those who could afford to paid a small amount; those who could not paid for their lessons with a few hens." 

MARIA ARTINI – ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING ALUMNA 

"Dear Professor, I have been asked by a colleague if any graphical solution has been published to the cubic equation x³+px=q. May I be so bold as to hand the question over to you?" 

Extracted from a letter dated 19 May 1943 written by Maria Artini to Ercole Bottani 

Daughter of Professor Ettore Artini, lecturer in Mineralogy at the Politecnico, she enrolled in the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the Politecnico in the academic year 1912-1913 and graduated with 90/100, officially becoming the second female graduate at the Politecnico di Milano (1918) and the first woman graduate in Electrical Engineering in Italy.

After a short period at the Società Officine ing. Giampiero Clerici, she moved to the Edison Group, where she became a manager and worked on the construction of the first ultra-high voltage power line, the 130 kV Brugherio-Parma, and studied the new 220 kV network. She was also part of the Italian Electrotechnical Association (AEI) and the Italian Electrotechnical Committee (CEI). 

In 1948, she began to take an interest in promoting personal relationships between female graduates in Engineering and Architecture. She organised a series of meetings with her colleagues from Milan and Turin with a view to a real partnership but died prematurely before seeing her project could be implemented. 

Sources:  

• Sara Calabrò (ed.), Dal Politecnico di Milano. Protagonisti e grandi progetti (Associazione Laureati del Politecnico di Milano, 2003)
• Enciclopedia delle donne: Maria Artini 

Cini Boeri graduated in 1951. In 2015 we met her among her works, some older than this writer, to hear about more than 60 years of her career through one of her latest monographic exhibitions: ’Designing joy’. We recall the famous architect travelling with dreamy eyes and irony through her long years and the history of twentieth century architecture and design while answering the questions from alumni:

AP: Cini, you graduated in 1951 and then opened your studio very early, in 1963. Your career took off among projects, teaching, research, leading to this exhibition, ‘Designing Joy’, a sort of compendium of your professional life.

CB: Yes. I didn't have to wait long after graduation to start working. I only worked with Gio’ Ponti for a year. He was the one who pushed me into the profession. He said: ‘You, with the colours you make, you must become an architect!’ Then I went on alone. I had a secretary and occasionally some interns practicing with me.

AP: During one interview, you said that a good part of your work consists of designing everyday objects, with the goal that they are not owned but rather used. The use of objects and the relationship with space can be a source of joy. What does that mean?

CB: When I design a house for a couple, for example, I always suggest including an extra room. They always ask, ‘Is it for guests?’ No! Not for guests. Because if one of them has a cold one night, for example, they can go to sleep in the other room. One should be able to choose, to know that they can sleep with their partner, but that they can also decide not to, without affecting their life as a couple. I think it would be very educational to teach young people that when they come together as a couple, it is not compulsory to share a bed; it is a choice. It is much nicer that way.

AP: So you think that everyday spaces can be used to educate people about different models of life?

CB: Exactly! Of course.

AP: In what way do you think your work can contribute to educating citizens?

CB: Society matures a bit on its own. Today people are more autonomous and independent. It is an ongoing process. As an architect, I can propose alternative ways of living and using spaces, facilitating an ongoing process of emancipation and promoting freedom of choice wherever possible.

AP: When speaking about your work, the words that often emerge are those of a democratic approach to architecture and design. What does that mean? Who were your intellectual fathers?

CB: It is the Politecnico that accustomed us to this. We were taught very openly … I don't know if it's still like that today!

AP: Can you tell us something about your time at Poli?

CB: Umm … we used to debate a lot! I started the course with mature ideas about independence and mutual responsibility. Even then I thought it was important to focus on individual freedom, and my projects have always tried to concretize this principle. So we debated! Even today, these ideas are unlikely to be accepted as serious proposals. The one about the extra bedroom, for example, is taken as a threat to marriage! But it isn’t. Learning to think for yourself benefits a couple’s well-being; it doesn’t threaten it.

AP: Who did you debate with? The teaching staff?

CB: Not necessarily. The professors were broad-minded. I remember, for example, Renato Camus (I guess he's no longer with us!), always oriented towards modernity, towards new ways of living. But the family model was still very traditional and hierarchical. Freedom was not always considered an acceptable tool.

AP: A tool?

CB: Freedom is a tool, in a broader sense. For example, when a child learns to do something on their own, they acquire both the responsibility of having to do it and the freedom to do it.

AP: You have had and still have many younger collaborators. What has changed in architects over the 60 years of your career?

CB: There is more freedom of action, more choice, and more awareness. This is due to both the general evolution of society and the fact that the profession is better recognised today; it has assumed a cultural and also aesthetic value. In my day, architects were viewed a bit like decorators, not as someone who makes a space functional, and that approach took away our main value — functionality. Functionality is an invitation to experience space in a certain way rather than another. In my case, it implies an invitation to remove dependence, to promote autonomy and reflection. Designing for functionality means designing for joy.

AP: You have not only designed spaces, though, but also designer items. Once, architecture and design were not two separate disciplines, but these days they are taught in two different schools at the Politecnico. What is the relationship between them?

CB: It is a very close relationship. The underlying reason for a project, whether it is a piece of furniture or a room, is always functionality. The features of the space are tied to its function. The same goes for design. Objects must help us to live in the space, not occupy it.

AP: Still on the subject of the relationship between the various disciplines at the Politecnico, here’s a recent statement by Renzo Piano: ‘During my years at the Politecnico, the idea grew in me that architects and engineers have the same profession.’ It is an invitation to reflect on the things that bind us as Politecnico alumni, rather than those that divide us. What do you think?

CB: [laughs] In some ways it's true! That is, they are not exactly the same thing, but a project cannot be realized without the collaboration of both. They are two very close professions and must work together. They are not the same thing though, because an engineer lacks one thing: a focus on the person’s needs. I mean, if I’m designing an apartment for a family, for example, I go to meet them, I spend time with them, I try to enter their family dynamics.

AP: What supports the relationship between you and your client?

CB: Communication and trust, which must be mutual. What I propose is not always what the client expects. We don't always understand each other immediately. For example, that extra bedroom thing has sometimes made me seem like a ‘marriage killer’ [laughs]. But that’s just not true! As an architect, I must know how to listen to and interpret their needs. The client must learn to trust. It usually works!

AP: Do your clients know what they want when they come to you?

CB: No! They want the best… [laughs], and usually, they want what they have seen. Once they presented me with nineteenth-century-style sofas, all shapes and spirals, today they come with abstract things that are useless. On the other hand, they believe that the architect contributes the novelty as such. Instead, I want to bring benefits to life! So we must listen to each other and meet each other in the middle. In the end, everyone is always very satisfied.

AP: You said in an interview that a project is born, to put it in polytechnic words, out of a process of analysis and synthesis. Could you further explain this to me?

CB: Il momento di analisi è quello dell’ascolto, in cui, come ho spiegato, imparo a conoscere il committente. Il momento di sintesi è quello creativo, che è altrettanto importante. Noi proponiamo il nuovo, che è frutto della creatività, ma non lo proponiamo in modo indiscriminato: deve avere un posto e una funzione chiara nella vita delle persone.

AP: Is it a ‘controlled creativity’?

CB: In a way … For example, if I have to design a chair, I don't just do the first thing that comes to mind. That would be stupid. Instead, I think about how we sit, how the different shapes of the human body can have the right support. The shape of the body determines the internal line of a seat, the starting point of the project. Functionality directs creativity.

AP: What is innovation for you?

CB: It is what brings a project closer to the client, to their needs, which are personal. To avoid repeating the same ideas over and over, the architect must be able to customize the project. They must know the client. And to know them, they must have an easy, direct way of communicating.

AP: So communication is a key factor in innovation?

CB: Exactly.

AP: Why did you choose to become an architect?

CB: Ah, that’s a difficult question! I don't know how to answer. Perhaps the defining moment was during the Resistance, when I met De Finetti in the mountains. At the beginning, he told me that I was a girl and that architecture was a man's profession. But then he would take me on walks, show me houses, ask me what I thought of them. And in the end, he told me that maybe I was serious enough to become an architect. ‘Remember that it is a serious thing,’ he told me, ’not a game.’

AP: Can you tell me something about the years of the Resistance?

CB: Ah, yes. I gave it my all, with a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of good effort. I was young! We started with the most mundane things, like bringing correspondence to the rebels in the mountains. Then things got serious. Eventually we led the partisan troops.

AP: Weren’t you scared?

CB: No, I was very passionate. My youth was determined by anti-fascism, which was fortunately alive in my family and our friends. I was already politicised in a certain sense with a sensitivity to the social context and its manifestations. It was all very clear. Anti-fascism had led us to the struggle, and the struggle to be the authors of a new society. I speak in the plural: I was not alone. I was surrounded by my peers.

AP: Did you know what you had to do?

CB: It was a simple war. We fought in the mountains, we shot, we went down to town to exchange documents, and we went back up. But it wasn't a mass of people, it wasn't an army. It was a way of being and thinking; it was our nature. And so it was natural for us to do that. In turn, the Resistance shaped my character and strengthened the principles passed on by my family.

AP: What did it mean to be partisans?

CB: It was a simple war. We fought in the mountains, we shot, we went down to town to exchange documents, and we went back up. But it wasn't a mass of people, it wasn't an army. It was a way of being and thinking; it was our nature. And so it was natural for us to do that. In turn, the Resistance shaped my character and strengthened the principles passed on by my family.

AP: Those principles which are the basis of your work ...

CB: That's right: autonomy, personal freedom, a democratic approach, responsibility, respect for others in interpersonal relationships … all these values, which have determined my career, come from there. I am happy with my profession, but if I had to choose another, I would be a teacher, even in a primary school. These are values that must be passed on.

AP: One last question and then I'll leave you to your guests. What is the most important lesson that the Politecnico taught you?

CB: Seriousness. Architecture is about building. It is discipline. When I was in the studio with Gio’ Ponti, he scolded me if I neglected details such as tidying up the desk. He said: ‘Architects do not make these kind of mistakes. An architect keeps everything organised, so that it is stable.’