Palazzo dei Musei

The restoration and consolidation project concerns a building complex of eighteenth-century origin in the heart of Modena's historic centre and takes on a city-wide scale. The intent of the intervention is to revitalize the buildings as a whole, recovering inner and outer areas. A historical analysis of the existing buildings through the acquisition of archive, bibliographic and iconographic documents has allowed the identification of historical specificities.

The guiding principle was the maintenance of the integrity of the complex and the compatibility of the new systems, ensuring: the focus on the installation criteria in respect of the environments and the activities within them, installation and management costs savings, the use of state-of-the-art equipment, at the same time compatible with the existing, as well as of tested and safe-operation technologies.

The intervention aims at the redevelopment of the entire complex through re-functionalisation and restoration, creating a place of strong socio-cultural interest. The definition of the goals and approach or intervention methods was supported by an in-depth process of knowledge on diverse areas of study and analysis. The complex encompasses the city's main cultural institutions: the Civic Museum, the Poletti Library, the Historical Archives, the Estense Library and Gallery, whose spaces have been enlarged and improved. Palazzo dei Musei area will be enhanced in its role as the Cultural Centre's reception area. The complex also provides exhibition spaces for temporary exhibitions and teaching.

Within the process of understanding the complex, the activity necessary and complementary to the stage of analysing the historical and bibliographical sources, was that of the direct confrontation with the artefact through an extensive campaign of visual and instrumental surveys, the results of which made it possible to achieve an even more conscious and extensive degree of knowledge.

Among the fundamental themes addressed in the project were those concerning the restoration of the external horizontal connectives of the courtyards and their paving, as well as the insertion of vertical ones, the restoration of the historical staircases and façades, and the reconstruction of the façade. These interventions made it possible, while respecting the historical and testimonial characteristics, to respond to the distributional demands that emerged in the new functional layout.

The restoration and seismic adaptation project of Palazzo dei Musei - Ex Ospedale Estense, is to be considered among the first restoration projects in Italy developed with BIM technology. From the registered and optimised 3D database a hierarchisation of information structured on historical-typological characters was generated, aimed at offering the maximum knowledge of historical memory and testimony useful and necessary for a conservation, maintenance, and monitoring project.

The historical-artistic value required an intervention aimed at increasing structural performance while respecting historical characteristics. The project provided for the recovery, and in many cases restoration, of the 18th-century buildings; recent buildings were instead to be replaced or subject to structurally more significant interventions. Increases in structural safety, especially in seismic actions, have been achieved throughout the complex.