Thanks to a citizen initiative led by the Old Nice Neighborhood Committee, a plaque with a QR code was installed on Wednesday, June 4th in the streets of the old town. Objective: to tell the local history, convey popular memory, and strengthen the bond between residents and visitors. Meet Bastien Gambaudo, president of the association.
“We wanted to keep that spirit from before.” In 2018, Bastien Gambaudo and a dozen childhood friends founded the Old Nice Neighborhood Committee. A group of friends bonded by years spent living together “like in a village,” where generations naturally helped each other. The initial idea? To maintain the spirit of solidarity and proximity that characterizes the historical heart of the city.
During the lockdown, they became known for delivering groceries to elderly or isolated people in buildings without elevators. A mobilization praised and relayed in the local press.
QR codes to flash history
In 2022, an idea was born: to make the history of Old Nice visible, often hidden at the level of plaques or statues. “We would look up, see details… but we had to search in books to know what it was,” explains Bastien Gambaudo.
With Tristan Baldelli, a teacher passionate about local history, and Damien Chambon, a technician who fell in love with the neighborhood, they imagine an “open-air and free museum”: flash a QR code to discover a forgotten slice of history. The first was installed recently, with four more to follow starting in September, on traffic signs, with the approval of the city hall and the heritage department.
A living project, between languages and anecdotes
For now, the QR codes offer simple texts in French and English, but the team hopes to go further. The addition of languages such as Niçoise, Italian, Spanish, and German is being considered, as well as audio or video content. However, “we don’t want to overload everything,” notes the neighborhood committee president. We want it to remain fluid, easy to use. The essential thing is the story.”
The chosen anecdotes are often little known: a forgotten business, a local figure, like an artist or a Niçoise tradition. “Even residents rediscover their street. And they thank us.”
Learning together, conveying differently
Beyond the historical aspect, the committee envisions an educational use for the project. “We are already connected with neighborhood schools,” says Bastien. The medium-term goal: to offer guided tours, have students participate, and enrich the content with feedback from the public.
This project complements the actions already undertaken by the association, which also offers tutoring courses and a local gazette mixing Niçoise, neighborhood life, and inhabitants’ stories.
Furthermore, the president of the Old Nice Neighborhood Committee specified that his team and he are considering expanding this project: “obviously there is room for expansion […] For now, it’s only Old Nice. The idea is to start somewhere. We would like to do more because we have prepared more than thirty streets. The historical work took two years, so it was something. We are ready to move forward further. It takes time […] we are considering another 3-4 years. We will deploy this in the streets little by little,” Bastien Gambaudo tells us.
This plaque will be found by both local citizens and tourists at the intersection of Rue Droite and Rue de la Loge.
For Bastien Gambaudo, history is not fixed: “history speaks to everyone. History can touch everyone.” With these QR codes, an entire section of popular memory is leaving the archives to be displayed in the street, accessible via smartphone.
