The BIM model for the study of historical buildings. “Palazzo del Sedile” - Bari

The survey of a historic building has always required, from one hand, a historical analysis concerning its construction and its evolutionary events and, from the other hand, the awareness and the two- dimensional or three-dimensional representation of its formal and material consistency. These two phases have been considered sufficient to provide a solid basis for the preparation of recovery and restoration projects. Indeed, only a correct approach to knowledge and an accurate interpretation of its geometrical and technological characteristics, can reveal the "reasons" of its construction and guide its transformation. The current contribution is aimed at verifying how much the forms of representation’s renewal, proposed by the multidimensional model defined in the BIM environment, can positively guide the phases of a historic building’s survey as a mean of its transformation. This hypothesis intends to confront the issue of reliability of the model and the related relapses in the representative environment, the relationship between the degree of the detection’s accuracy of the actual physical form and the level of detail of the modeling, by mediating between the established habits, the regulatory dictates and the possibilities offered by new technologies. The case study concerns the most significant architectural monument in the urban scene of Piazza Mercantile, core space of Bari’s old town.