Portale di Ateneo - En.Unibs.it

An ancient building is a complex document that transmits - through its shape and the material with which it is built - tastes, skills and technical knowledge often forgotten and therefore rare and worthy of being preserved and passed on to future generations. Intervention on an ancient building, therefore, presupposes in-depth knowledge of it.
The Course and the Laboratory will offer an introduction to the most important theories and methods in building conservation, and on how these methods can be used as a basis for planning interventions in existing built environments. The work is usually based on a field study of a given building, including documentation and a proposal for a strategy for future development, and assessment based on conservation theories.
Within a knowledge framework based on historical-documentary research, students will learn the most appropriate techniques to characterize and quantify the typical decay processes of structures and materials.
The student will be provided with the necessary skills to set up a conservation project by drawing critically on the repertoire of intervention techniques analysed during the lessons and treated in more depth in the study of the bibliography.
The reuse of an existing building may require the introduction of new functions and new elements. It should not, however, involve the sacrifice of elements that can still be used, but rather qualify itself for the effort shown in minimizing the subtraction of historical material, in avoiding unnecessary replacements and in carefully defining the elements of detail in a coherent dialogue between the design of the new and the permanence of the old.
The student will be able to recognize the importance of the conservation of the material data and the care of the legacy of the past, facing in a coherent and conscious way the challenges that a historical building poses when new needs for reuse require the improvement of its conditions of efficiency, safety, usability and decorum.