SIMILAR INTERVENTIONS

SHELTERS FOR ROMAN ARCHEOLOGICAL SITE, 1985-86. Peter Zumthor

The protective lightweight wooden enclosures follow the outer walls of two of the original adjacent buildings as well as a third building of which only a corner was excavated and visible. By following the original perimeter, Zumthor conceived these "cases" as an abstract volumetric reconstruction of the Roman buildings. But only in footprint, not in height. 

Exterior of the building

An enigmatic metal box comes out apparently suspended from one of the building's wooden facades. This mysterious floating access contains a small stair and a solid steel door. This door opens into a long metal footbridge which runs across the interior of all the building at a raised observation level. Suspended here above the ground, Zumthor's design definitely works as a machine that allows the visitor the unique opportunity of walking down the stairs to step on real Roman soil. The visitor walks along the metal footbridge though dark connecting tunnels from one building to another. A few light metal stairs allow the connection down to the Roman soil.

Interior of the building

Zumthor's design has no ordinary windows, but the timber lamella walls admit light and air into the structure, filtering warm light and allowing the position of the sun to shine through the structure. Zenithal colours metal skylights provide extra light into the interiors. 

Detail of the skylights

Sections

RESTORATION AND CONSOLIDATION OF THE ROMAN FORUM OF GIRONA, 2009. Lola Domenech

Domenech makes an effort to recreate and make more powerful both the ambience as the distinctive characteristics of public buildings of I-III a.C. centuries.

View of the ruins

Once the mistaken interventions made in previous archeological works have been eliminated, the project takes into account the need of giving a solution to the accessibility of the forum and the spaces of the ancient roman town, recognizing the urban logic of the cardus i decumanus in footbridges, stairs and ramps made in wood. 

Wooden ramps, stairs and footbridges

Through those elements, placed securind the minimum impact and consolidating and restoring the most significant elements of the forum, the atmosphere's recreation is strenghten showing how the spaces were though platforms, elevated spaces, paths and walking itineraries. The materiales and constructive techniques search the balance and relation between original ruins and new interventions, avoiding mimicry and false reproductions. 

Detail of the skylight

VESSUNA GALLO-ROMAN MUSEUM, 2003. Jean Nouvel

Nouvel has enclosed the extensive ruin in glass, supported by thin steel columns. The tall lightweight roof, calculated geometrically from the plan of the house, has deep overhangs to keep the sun. Nature and views of the surrounding town, visible through the trees or reflected on the glass walls, add to the magic of the building. 

Exterior of the building

A small 18th-century house next to the ruin, once the workplace of the first archaeologist to work on the excavations of Roman Périgueux, has been restored by Nouvel.

Workplace of the first archaeologist

Inside the museum the structural elements are lightweight steel with a series of raised wooden walkways, around and above the remains that guide visitors though the house describing the daily lives of its occupants. 

Interior of the museum

The house was built around a garden courtyard bordered by a peristyle colonnade. Nouvel has drawn a full-scale mirrored plan of the ceiling, extending beyond the glass walls, to make the layout of the villa understandable.