ABSTRACT
The paper is aimed to summarise the current methodology used by Italian designers when dealing with pile foundations. To give the possibility to better understand the reasons on the basis of which some design criteria are more widespread than others, some (necessarily brief) information are given about regional geology, common practice for soil investigations and Italian pile market. To this aim, explicit reference to publications, papers and textbooks was necessary. Finally, some practical indications coming from relevant under way research activities in Italy will be shown in a due detail, with the hope that the results might be helpful to other European countries.
