Valerio Francia is a building and architectural engineer graduated at University of Bologna (2016), who is keen on urban issues, especially on those regarding life within public space. In 2013 he co-founded City Space Architecture, a non-profit organization with a mission to studying, making, spreading and sharing public space culture, through an interdisciplinary approach involving art and architecture. Through this organization he has been engaged in several activities, such as research projects, photography research projects and art events, in order to contribute the development of our cities by actively promoting a shareable urban culture and making them more sustainable. Valerio is currently committed to contribute the implementation of the New Urban Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals, especially the Goal 11, by studing the interaction between public life and public space.

In 2017 he has created CoUrbanLab, a cognitive urban think tank that studies urban life, empowers citizens and creates solutions to foster social inclusion and better quality of public life in public space. In 2018 he became Local Pathways Fellow of UN-Sustainable Development Solution Network-Youth (SDSN Youth), starting a 12-month journey to explore pathways for localizing the globally adopted goals and targets that relate to sustainable urban development. His ongoing project is “MUP – Mapping Urban Perception”, an interactive web-GIS tool for the public space design project and management, and is been awarded in the “Youth in Action for Sustainable Development Goals” competition (2018) promoted by Fondazione Italiana Accenture, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei, Fondazione GianGiacomo Feltrinelli and aimed to award young people with the best ideas to achieve the SDGs.