“Fazer do Bairro a Nossa Casa” is community pilot project that aims to bring together children and the elderly in Penha de França, Lisbon. It will last for three months and will feature a competition for ideas from residents of the neighbourhood to develop initiatives among children and the elderly in the area of social isolation.

According to Público, the project was the brainchild of Sílvia Cardoso and Kitti Baracsi, who describe themselves as two “single and precarious” mothers living between Penha de França and Graça. Kitti Baracsi is a 37-year-old Hungarian researcher, who joined her neighbour Sílvia Cardoso, a 38-year-old Lisbon anthropologist, to develop the initiative.

The project “Fazer do Bairro a Nossa Casa” will create “a network of intergenerational solidarity” through initiatives in the public space and in institutions in the parish of Penha de França to “fight the isolation of vulnerable groups”, explain the promoters of the project.

“Currently, there are not many spaces where children and the elderly can get together in Lisbon and this is very important in this area, which is undergoing transformation: it has a very isolated elderly population and new families that arrive every day, even from outside”, said Kitti Baracsi, cited by the publication.