Design and Installation of Superlight Construction Systems for the Sun Protection of Cultural Heritage: Ongoing Research and Field Tests in Milan and Pompeii

The chapter presents two experimental research tasks conducted by a multidisciplinary group of scholars of restoration, architectural composition, technical physics, and technical architecture and coordinated by architectural technology researchers. We intend to present the entire workflow – multi-criteria analysis, acquisition of experimental data, design, prototyping, installation, and monitoring – inherent to two different environmental protection devices of museum spaces. The first case study (Castello Sforzesco) concerns the creation of protective screens applied to the windows of the Sala delle Asse and optimized for the correct conservation of Leonardo da Vinci’s monochrome preserved there. The second case study (Pompeii) concerns the design of a ventilated textile roof for the protection of the mosaics and frescoes of the House of Orion. Through the two case studies, the authors intend to present an innovative intervention methodology to ensure the usability and conservation of the heritage, through the design of ultra-lightweight, durable and reversible construction systems, free of metal parts and capable of fully exploiting the optical-visual, thermo-hygrometric and mechanical properties of technical textiles and ultra-lightweight tensile membrane systems.