Client: Regional Management for Cultural and Landscape Properties in Piedmont

The project, developed for Regional Management for Cultural and Landscape Properties in Piedmont, in cooperation with Engineering Sanità ed Enti Locali, a quoted Italian IT Company, had the aim to follow the steps of restoration of Guarini’s Chapel of the Holy Shroud, which burnt after a terrible fire flared up in the night between 11 and 12 April 1997.

In 2002 GESP developed a system to be used, on yard, to catalogue all the fragments that the restorer were arranging and classifying. With that system they were able to assign to each element its characteristics in terms of material, original position, deterioration state, position inside collecting box, etc, and so to maintain memory of their history pre-fire. In 2006 the Regional Management for Cultural and Landscape Properties asked for a web application to follow all the steps of the restoration of the chapel, integrating the previously collected fragments data.

The system consist of an Web GIS application related to a Document Management System, which contains all the data related to the ashlars, and their history.

The GIS application has been developed using MapServer on PostgreSQL database.

The Navigation window allows the restorer to move inside the architectural representation of the chapel, viewing it on front (main window) or from different sections, Detail windows, and to switch inside main window between front or section views.

Using the tree structure, restorer for Cultural and Landscape Properties may reach a single ashlar or an architectonic structure, viewing the relevant components. He may also switch on/off the different level of perspective in order to better view the architectural components which are behind others, rendering a 3 dimensional view. Standard GIS tool allow to query the ashlars (conci), to view their positional data and to link to relevant "card", documents and images.

An advanced query builder has been developed to help the restorers to better manage the restoration process, individuating components with particular problems or that need similar interventions. A specific tool has been developed in order to produce thematic representations basing on special characteristics, like status of conservation, maintaining interventions, etc.

The historical managing of the data allows to investigate the evolution of some indicators and so to run prediction of the evolving trend.