Heritage conservation

Heritage conservation – at first I thought it was only for those old and significant buildings. But as we studied all about heritage conservation, I learned that it envelops a larger scale than that of just old buildings, in fact, anything that could be improve, preserve or develop in our country is part of the heritage conservation. Even a whole city or community can be part of heritage conservation.

                There are many processes on heritage conservation. One is the restoration, the process wherein we bring back the original state or form of a structure. Another one is the renovation, it is remodeling, or improving a structure in terms of its plan, structural, finishes, etc. we also have the facadism wherein the façade is the only one left from the original structure then changing or improving the rest of the structure. Another process is retrofitting wherein you put modern technologies to old structure. The next one is adaptive reuse; this conservation process gives the building a new function, changing its building type. What I like in this process is that when a building or any structure is not working for its function anymore, it could be changed, it’s like reincarnation, the same spirit but a different life, same structure but a different use. Another process is expansion wherein there would be an addition space to the original structure. In this process, one has the option to use either modern or revival approach and for me, that was my favorite among all the processes of conservation.

                In expansion of a building, we get to design a new structure without changing or altering the original one. We could design something that could enhance or contrast the original structure and most of all we could design something that compliments the original structure and vice versa. One very good example of expansion is the Louvre museum in Paris. It is my favorite structure of I.M. Pei. Though it was controversial, I think, because of that structure, the Louvre museum became famous again. The very modern structure compliments the medieval style of the old structure. In this expansion, I.M Pei went for the modern approach and it was very successful, it didn’t over power the old structure but compliments it. It was the same with Daniel libeskind’s museum in Toronto Canada. Those are structures that uses modern approach and complimenting the old structure and that was my favorite part, old structure gets to be known again or be famous again because of these modern designs that brings out the beauty of the old structures that seems to be forgotten because of the phase of these modern structures that keeps on evolving, but if combined together, it actually gives more character to each other. We should just be careful and sensitive enough when designing this kinds of buildings.