In 1967, while Florence was on the verge of bursting on the national and international scene for being a hot bed of radical literature, design, art, and architecture, there was a minuscule nation being built off the coast of Rimini, Italy.
Engineer Giorgio Rosa began constructing a platform 500 meters outside of the Italian territorial waters and on June 24, 1968, this platform became a sovereign nation known as Rose Island. Soon a post office was established and a national currency, the mill, was decreed. One month prior to this moment student riots had broken out at the 14th Triennial. These protests were a part of a larger student uprising at the time—a rebellion against mass consumption and the loss of individuality. There was a fear of personal identity disappearing behind the machine of capitalism and government.
Ironically the island seems to have been a place of consumption and elitism as the respubliko de la insulo de la rozo became a place of tax free shopping, a place to simply grab a drink, and a place to watch ships in the Adriatic pass by. Anyone with a boat could make it out to the island republic. Unfortunately Rose Island quickly attracted the (negative) attention of the Italian government, regardless of the fact the nation was formed lawfully. Italy cared little for this fact and set out to squash this outpost—first severing its trade routes and then preventing visitors from accessing the platform. By January 22, of 1969, the republic disappeared as the platform was demolished. Rose Island exists no more, its remnants washed out to sea by a storm.
