Construction and degradation.

The case of the Church of “San Lorenzo”

ABSTRACT:
A recovery intervention of historical building, whatever its architectural or artistic value
might be, is as much appropriate as deeper the knowledge of its history, its transformations
and materials and constructive techniques, as well. Therefore, considering a monument as
expression of belonging to a defined environment, it is necessary to plan the possibility to
preserve it from any deterioration; in this way, the importance of the diagnostic phase
become the best way to design a recovery intervention; moreover, it permits to control the
global system behavior of the structure, in particular within a long-term building
maintenance program aimed to guarantee the durability of building, too.
This methodological approach was tested in the study of an ancient church where the
environmental conditions and the constructive systems characterize in a significant way the
conservation process of building; in fact, the same materials and technological elements
show different behaviors with respect to the action of degradation, according to the position
in the ‘structural hierarchy’, to the used construction systems and to the position within the
building, too. The research focus on the study of the church of “San Lorenzo” in Laterza, an
ancient building built in XV century in the historical centre of the city. The analysis and
qualification of constructive building system points out how much useful this approach is, in
order to classify interesting pathological events and implement innovative solutions that
could guarantee the durability of the recovery intervention on the building.