Underground archaeological sites as drivers for social regeneration: the catacombs of San Gennaro in Naples

The paper describes how the underground route of Catacombe di San Gennaro (St. Gennaro Catacombs) became a resource for one of the less visible and socially depressed districts of the city: the Rione Sanità. Renaissance of the Rione Sanità was a surprisingly a very fast process if compared to 200 years of its total abandonment; UBH played a fundamental role. Antonio Loffredo, the illuminated priest who moved to the church Santa Maria alla Sanità in 2001, was at the core of the transformation of "the UBH Beauty" into a resource (Loffredo, 2015). He started his work welcoming kids of Rione Sanità in the gardens and in the church's cloister and rooms involving them into interactive activities, and step by step, in several training programs encouraging those boys in investing on themselves, in spite of the social contest; he stimulated their formation, organized sponsored tours abroad and laboratories of art crafts. What is the secret of this successful experience? Of course the significant implementation of UBH enhanced plays a fundamental role in this process but there is more, the paper analyzes the influence of the social experiment itself and of the involvement of well trained and motivated local boys and girls, well externalized by an effective communicative strategy, on this case-study.