[Authors and titles are listed at the end of the review.]
This volume brings together a selection of papers first presented at the “International Conference on Architecture, Urban Planning and Restoration” (Sapienza University, 2017), and the follow‑up workshop held in the hill‑town of Ciciliano. The editors have organised the book into two parts: eleven research essays that range from archaeometric study to strategic landscape planning and a pair of reflective texts describing the workshop’s method and pedagogical lessons. The declared goal is to set Italian and Iranian experiences of built‑heritage care in reciprocal relief, while anchoring the discussion in concrete case studies.
The book opens with Daniela Esposito’s preface, which frames the initiative as a test of the university’s vocation to foster “universal” knowledge across disciplinary and national borders. Javad Ghorbani and Alessandro Viscogliosi situate the meeting within a wider collaboration program between Sapienza and Iranian institutions. The reader already senses the book’s main strength: a sincere commitment to dialogue that bridges the Italian peninsula and the Iranian plateau, design practice and materials science, conservation history and digital survey. The eleven “Selected Papers” illustrate this breadth.
The first, by Angela Baldanza, Maria Romana Picuti, Mirco Vantaggi and Patrizia Santi, exemplifies the analytic rigour the editors hope to promote. Through thin‑section petrography, trace‑element chemistry and micropaleontological dating, the authors identify the limestone and volcanic sources of tesserae in four Roman period mosaics at Bevagna. Their conclusions—local pink to whitened Scaglia Rossa and Corniola limestones contrasted with black tephrites transported from the Roman Volcanic Province (i.e., southern modern Lazio)—shed light on quarry organisation and trade routes, demonstrating how geological precision can guide future maintenance. The crisp argument, supported by clear tables and photomicrographs, sets a high methodological benchmark for archaeometric studies.
Lia Barelli and Michele Asciutti narrate the conservation of the southwest tower of SS. Quattro Coronati in Rome. The authors combine archival research, stratigraphic reading and targeted archaeological probes to produce a convincing “transition project” that allows necessary conservation to be undertaken while preserving medieval fabric. Their discussion of reversible ventilation cavities and timber ring‑beams shows how material philology and architectural design can work together.
Saghi Boloubari then moves the reader to central Iran, proposing that the vernacular courtyard houses of Yazd, with their wind catchers, subterranean summer rooms and qanat‑fed pools, offer lessons for contemporary zero‑energy skyscrapers. The essay is conceptually engaging, but the leap from horizontal courtyard to vertical tower remains schematic; energy simulations would have reinforced the claim. Still, by foregrounding Yazd as a “living laboratory” of hot‑arid adaptation, Boloubari usefully expands global sustainability discourse.
Gianni Bulian’s richly illustrated study of the Museo Nazionale Romano within the Baths of Diocletian shows what a carefully argued “design within history” can achieve. He tracks three decades of incremental insertions, reversible steel walkways, fibre‑optic light cannons, and glass floor panels, demonstrating how new museography can enhance, rather than obscure, multi‑period masonry. The piece reads at times like a dossier, but it offers a persuasive methodology: treat services and visitor flow as tools for interpretation, not incursions to be hidden at all costs.
The digital turn appears in Mario Docci, Alfonso Ippolito and Martina Attenni’s review of virtual models. They convincingly argue that the true value of laser scans and photogrammetry lies in a multi‑layer HBIM (Heritage Building Information Modelling) workflow able to link raw points to thematic information, structural decay, seismic vulnerability, legal status, and thus to inform both preventive conservation and emergency response. The conceptual clarity of their workflow complements the more fabric‑focused Italian case studies.
Iraj Etessam’s brisk overview of modern Iranian architecture (Qajar to the Islamic Republic) serves as a primer for readers unfamiliar with the terrain. The periodisation is helpful: from Nasser‑eddin Shah’s partial Europeanisation, through Reza Shah’s state‑driven classicism, to post‑1950 modernism imported by graduates from Paris and Rome, and finally to post‑1979 identity debates. The essay is primarily descriptive, yet it offers readers unfamiliar with the terrain a useful historical frame for the Iranian contributions that follow.
Sante Guido places St John’s Co‑Cathedral in Valletta at the core of Maltese cultural identity. His narrative of Grand‑Master patronage culminating in the Italo‑Maltese conservation campaign of 1997‑2008, illustrates how heritage diplomacy can accompany technical restoration. The descriptive richness is valuable, though occasional factual compression would benefit from fuller footnote precision on Mazzuoli’s timetable.
Farah Habib argues that Iran’s cultural and environmental diversity demands locally differentiated planning rather than the adoption of global urban models. While visual references to cities like Tehran, Hamadan, and Mashhad gesture toward this diversity, more detailed case-specific analysis would sharpen the argument. The call to revalue intangible cultural heritage as a tool for sustainable development feels both timely and necessary.
Valeria Montanari examines Norcia’s long history of rebuilding after earthquakes, showing how the town’s urban form—marked by low-rise buildings, thickened walls, and lowered towers—was preserved through careful, historically informed restoration. She argues that the response to the 2016–17 earthquakes should continue this tradition, treating Norcia’s layered anti-seismic adaptations as a living heritage rather than replacing them with entirely new models.
Monica Morbidelli’s paper returns us to Lazio, where her Parco del Burio proposal in Anticoli Corrado stands out for its modesty and care. Rather than overhauling the site, she suggests stabilizing the half-collapsed cattle stables, inserting a discreet glass lift screened by vegetation, and reimagining the area as an open-air extension of the local modern art museum. The exposition is clear and precise, with sociocultural aims (job creation, integration into the territorial museum system) coherently aligned with technical choices such as lime-poor mortars and patching. The project makes a compelling case for reviving rural heritage without slipping into tourist-village pastiche.
The final research paper, by Maria Grazia Turco, shifts the perspective outward to address the vulnerabilities of cultural heritage in the face of abandonment, conflict, and natural disasters. Moving between case studies from Bamiyan to Palmyra and from Friuli to L’Aquila, Turco highlights how trauma and loss shape both the material and symbolic dimensions of historic sites. Her analysis draws on a wide and compelling set of examples to advocate for principles such as minimum intervention, urban stitching, and compatible additions. These tools are not only technically sensitive but culturally attuned, helping to preserve identity without resorting to replication. Her conclusion, an urgent appeal for internationally coordinated and context-aware responses, adds weight to the volume’s overarching call for timely and thoughtful action.
The book concludes with two essays documenting the Ciciliano workshop. Romano Cerro offers a clear and attentive reading of the site: the cliff-edge void, the Theodoli Castle presiding above, and the hidden centuriation shaping the surrounding valleys. Riccardo d’Aquino’s “Several Notes” takes a more personal and reflective tone, candidly recounting what students learned and where they fell short. He laments their struggles with hand sketching, their dependence on instantaneous digital imagery, and their difficulty in translating direct observation into coherent architectural proposals. His call for renewed emphasis on freehand drawing and precedent study is one that will resonate with architectural educators worldwide. Together, the two essays vividly dramatize the broader pedagogical challenge of transforming analytical understanding into effective design practice.
Taken together, Cities: The Future of the Past fulfils Esposito’s aim: to show the university acting as mediator between inherited fabric and yet‑unbuilt possibilities. The Italian chapters demonstrate how stratigraphic reading, reversible detail, and measured reuse can sustain historic towns. The Iranian contributions, meanwhile, invite Italian specialists to look beyond their own seas and learn from climates, materials, and settlement patterns that anticipate tomorrow’s ecological demands. The abundance of colour plates is welcome, though several key drawings are reproduced too small for professional scrutiny. The final workshop narrative shows how such knowledge can be carried into design teaching, transforming a collapsed fragment in Ciciliano into an exercise in empathy, critical observation, and responsible invention.
The dynamic assembly of contributions gives the volume a sense of immediacy that mirrors the lively exchange it records. The book opens a valuable path for further exchanges, joint studios, and comparative research between Italy and Iran. Students will find a gallery of concrete case studies, while practitioners will be reminded that whether working on Roman baths, Maltese gilt, or Iranian qanats, successful conservation always blends rigorous evidence, creative adaptation, and respect for place. Above all, the book demonstrates that across different geographies, from the Tyrrhenian coast to the Iranian plateau, scholars and designers still share a common language of responsible care for the built environment.
Authors and Titles
Angela Baldanza, Maria Romana Picuti, Mirco Vantaggi & Patrizia Santi: Local and imported lithotypes in four late-antique mosaics at Bevagna: an integrated petrographic, geochemical and micropalaeontological study
Lia Barelli & Michele Asciutti: Reading, conserving and adapting the south-west tower of Santi Quattro Coronati, Rome
Saghi Boloubari: Vernacular Yazd as a paradigm for net-zero vertical architecture in hot-arid climates
Gianni Bulian: Design in history: incremental museography at the Baths of Diocletian, National Roman Museum
Mario Docci, Alfonso Ippolito & Martina Attenni: From point cloud to HBIM: a workflow for preventive conservation and risk management
Iraj Etessam: Contemporary architecture of Iran: from Qajar eclecticism to the Islamic Republic
Sante Guido: “Humilissima Civitas Valettae”: The Co-Cathedral of St John and twenty years of Italo-Maltese conservation
Farah Habib: The beauty of diversity: timeless lessons of Iranian cultural heritage for sustainable urban development
Valeria Montanari: Norcia: identity of architecture and landscape after the 2016 earthquake
Monica Morbidelli: Conservation and development for the Burio quarter at Anticoli Corrado: between historic settlement and agricultural landscape
Maria Grazia Turco: Cultural heritage at risk from abandonment, conflict and natural hazards: principles for protection and safeguard
Workshop outcomes
Romano Cerro: Cities: the future of the past. Design in historical landscapes
Riccardo d’Aquino: Several notes on the Ciciliano workshop