Friday, 21 March 2025, unfolded as a two-part celebration of collaboration at BE-STREET Alba. The afternoon opened with a one-hour breaking workshop led by international mentor Willstr8, who brought together the core Breaking the Walls dancers from BE-STREET and Check the Style and a handful of guest breakers eager to join the creative journey. From the first downbeat at 17:00, the room pulsed with call-and-response footwork that forced instant eye-contact and trust, dissolving the invisible barriers that often separate crews. Midway through the session, Willstr8 invited small groups to riff on the twin ideas of “Barrier” and “Breakthrough,” encouraging participants to translate abstract notions into eight-count movement sketches. As each team showed its fragment and explained the choices behind it, the atmosphere shifted from individual display to genuine co-creation—exactly the mindset required to build the large-scale stage work slated for 2026. The mentor closed the workshop by reminding everyone that the day’s goal was not perfect rounds but the art of listening to one another in real time.

At 18:30 the crash mats gave way to rows of chairs as locals packed the studio for the public launch of the European project. Project leads Max Oliveira, Jacopo Scotti, Martin Gillian and logistics coordinator Enrico Signa traced the vision that links skateboarding, rap and breaking in a single creative pipeline, while dance-therapy specialist Paola Castagno and art-therapy expert Carola Eirale explained how mental-health practice forms the backbone of every technical session. They invited schools, youth workers and local businesses to join as satellite partners, emphasising that Breaking the Walls is as much a civic experiment as an artistic one. The audience’s enthusiasm was summed up by a resident who noted that Alba has long celebrated wine culture and is now ready to host street culture with equal pride.

The night ended with informal conversations over espresso and beatboxing riffs, leaving dancers energised for the April rehearsals and citizens curious to follow the project’s next milestones in L’Aquila and Banská Bystrica.

Written by the Breaking the Walls editorial team – 23 March 2025