An infrastructure for the South
In Catania since 2020: six years to turn a place into a projectand a project into a sustainable model.
Between the first and the second lockdown, while some 100,000 remote workers (the so-called “south workers”) were moving back to the South, an idea was born: to create a community hub.
Despite its metropolitan size, a favourable climate and an enviable historic and natural heritage, a systemic problem of socio-economic underdevelopment has always kept Catania at the bottom of the national quality of life rankings, with figures that the pandemic made even harsher.
Depopulation, educational poverty, brain drain, economic underdevelopment, low civic participation: from this clear-eyed reading of the region came the wish to mend the social fabric, starting from young professionals. The convergence of the desire to return to the South and the shift to remote work first gave rise to a physical hub, then to a social impact project.
Istat, 2020
Il Sole 24 Ore, 2020
Fondazione Migrantes, 2020
EY Venture Capital Barometer 2020; MIMIT/InfoCamere, 2020
Figures refer to 2020, the year Isola was founded.
Six years in six milestones
The idea becomes a place
The idea became reality when we found the perfect place to bring it to life: Palazzo Biscari. Thanks to the investment of Arcadia Holding, we began restoring the east wing of the Palazzo, bringing back into contemporary life a building that holds the soul and history of the city.
Isola Life opens
We open our first space, Isola Life: 400 m² and 17 rooms, each named after a Mediterranean island, shared between coworking, meeting rooms and an event area. Its debut is marked by Make in South, Isola’s flagship event, held again at every change of season for no fewer than 16 editions. The event’s title is a true call to action: turning the South into a laboratory of entrepreneurial, technological and social innovation.
Isola Work is born
A space for startups, local SMEs and corporates from the rest of the country that choose to invest in the South, offering opportunities to local young people in digital, project design and international cooperation. 600 m², 70 workstations, a lively environment of talent, professionals and entrepreneurs.
We become a social enterprise
Isola goes from “container” to content creator: after listening to the needs and expectations of 54 local organisations working in the social sector, culture and innovation, it builds a social innovation strategy, supported by the Invitalia and a|cube acceleration programme. Arcadia transfers the Isola business unit into a new legal entity: Isola is incorporated as an S.r.l. qualified as a social enterprise, founded by five partners, four of them non-profit.
From experiments to projects
Isola launches its own projects and events to support young women and men on their entrepreneurial and professional journeys. During the year it brings to Catania, and co-organises, three major international non-profit events. Isola also founds Fondazione Marea, the participatory philanthropic foundation that brings together the donations and skills of 400 Sicilian professionals and entrepreneurs to turn the Sicilian diaspora into a community.
Consolidation and growth
Isola completes its first three years as a social enterprise: a period of experimentation, with almost three thousand young people involved in its activities and a platform of more than one hundred organisations it works with. Three new partners join the shareholder base: national organisations, two of them non-profit and one active in impact investing, which choose to invest in Sicily. B Corp certification brings Isola into the global movement of organisations using business as a lever for change. Isola is already looking at the next three years, working on the 2026-2028 Strategic Plan with open governance that involves all its internal and external stakeholders.
The story continues
The 2026-2028 Strategic Plan period begins, a plan built with Isola’s stakeholders: shareholders, staff, partners, institutions, the third sector and beneficiaries. The commitment Isola renews is to strengthen the agency of new generations in overcoming the barriers that stand in the way of work, self-employment and enterprise.
The Plan sets a three-year budget and a dashboard of eighty indicators split between impact, outcome and output: two of them measure people’s self-determination, and the hires, cases of self-employment and enterprises generated by the programmes.
Let’s do it together
Let’s write the next chapters together
Come and visit us, join a programme, build an impact project with us. Let’s write the next chapter of Isola together.
Let’s do it together
Let’s write the next chapters together
Come and visit us, join a programme, build an impact project with us. Let’s write the next chapter of Isola together.
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