Restoration in Architecture: First Dialogue

Camillo Boito (1836 1914) was one of the founding figures of modern Italian conservation. In this key text, originally titled I restauri in architettura, published in Questioni pratiche di belle arti, restauri, concorsi, legislazione, professione, insegnamento (1893), Boito lays out a theory of conservation that rejects the clear dichotomy between stylistic restoration and conservation. From the dialectic, Boito s own theory of preservation emerges: a critical philological approach that distinguishes between layers of intervention in order to keep all authentic historical layers of a building intact.