Lo Tommasi Architecture and Restoration Studio, born in the late 1970s in Saccolongo in the province of Padua, by architect Gianni Tommasi joined since 2016 by his son architect Tommaso, a reality closely linked to the territory, specialising in the recovery and restoration of listed buildings, received by the Administration Municipality of Citadel the assignment for the restoration and functional recovery of the Association Buildingdestined to become the city museum.
The three-storey rectangular building with a four-pitch roof is located in the historical centre of Cittadellaparticularly significant location, adjacent to the cathedral building and bell tower.
The main façade with the porticoed ground floor overlooks Via Marconi, which, considering the traditional Roman layout of Cittadella's historical centre, constitutes the 'decumanus', the most important and main street.
The palace is called Delle associazioni (of the associations) because of its more recent use, since the 1970s and until its current closure, in fact, it was used as the headquarters and meeting point of the city's associations. It actually served as a school building for more than a century.
The neoclassical layout of the building is now only visible in the main façade: the colonnaded portico with Doric capitals, the entablature in soft Vicenza stone, the phorometries of the two upper floors with the windows symmetrically scanned and framed also in soft stone, with the three central ones having a tympanum.
Internally, on the other hand, heavy alterations in the 1960s profoundly changed the layout.
Crucial in the search for historical documentation was the material kept in the archives of the Cathedral Museum, where it was possible to recover considerable documentation on the evolution of the areas adjacent to the Cathedral itself and its surroundings.
The material made it possible to date the construction of the school building between 1840 and 1846 by theing. Carlo Foscolo. On the other hand, there is no trace documenting the events after the construction of the Palace and the subsequent renovations, neither in the municipal archives nor in other institutions.
It has been possible to deduce, with good approximation, from the study of the essays and material analyses that only the area walls, the main façade and the roof are part of the original constructionwhile the internal structures (inter-floor floors, wall partitions and the staircase leading to the first floor) have been completely tampered with and heavily remodelled (from the type of materials used, it can be deduced that the renovation work was carried out in the 1960s) to the point that no indication of the original internal distribution can be drawn.
For this reason, the restoration work envisaged in the final project includes strictly conservative work on the façade and its decorative elements to preserve its original characteristics, and greater flexibility inside the building where it will be possible to combine the conservation requirements with the distributional ones related to the new museum destination by exploiting the full potential of the spaces.
Given the state of preservation and the new public use as a museum, it was necessary to carry out preliminary static checks of the building's structures (foundations, masonry, floors and roof) to verify their consistency, state of preservation and load-bearing capacity.
The results of the verifications certified that the building does not meet the requirements of the standards to be used as a public space and therefore it was necessary to proceed with static verifications of the different components, according to the values required by the regulations in force.
Firstly, the need emerged to provide static reinforcement of vertical structures and floors and therefore, with the aim of preserving the existing structures, the project envisages the construction of steel portals defined by pillars and beams.
The pillars will be leaning against the existing masonry where possible without affecting it and will be shielded by counterwalls plasterboard up to the ceiling, which will also have a display function, while the beams, which will remain visible, will be positioned at the soffit of the floors.
The consolidation project The objective was therefore to meet static requirements, while respecting the existing structures and architectural and display requirements, by creating an independent and discreet mesh that does not compromise the distribution and aesthetic character of the rooms.
On the other hand, the verification of the state of conservation of the roof structures has shown that the main roof rafters are in a good state of conservation and therefore their preservation is envisaged, but with the removal of the roof covering redefined by the laying of new wooden distribution rafters, the recovery of the existing terracotta tiles, the laying of an intermediate layer of insulation and the arrangement of the roof covering in tiles with the recovery of the existing ones in good condition.
Le interior finishing works were designed with the intention of giving the new museum a sober yet elegant appearance, while respecting the building's historical features and urban importance.
It is planned to renovate and replace floors that on the ground floor will be in stone material (Palladian with light-coloured inserts) while on the first and second floors will be in wooden planks (oak).
After the removal of the interior plaster of the vertical walls and ceilings, the removal of the false ceiling boards on the top floor, the resurfacing of the ground floor substrates and the screeds on the first and second floors and the false ceilings on the second floor, the surface finish of the walls will be made with a marmorino made of lime, marble powders and natural earths for the colouring and will have light tones to recall the tones of the Palladian and the staircase cladding.
The new interior layout envisages the preservation of the main vertical elements, even though they have been heavily reworked over time, and the elimination of the clearly distinguishable dividing partitions as superfetations in order to establish a clear and intuitable internal route for the visitor.
In particular, the ground floor will be used mainly for ticketing and distribution functions, the room behind the ticket office will be used for temporary exhibitions and will serve as a distribution space and access to the rear garden, the rooms to the right will house the bookshop and a conference room, while the rooms on the left will be used as an archive, staff office and services.
The first and second floors will be entirely dedicated to museum exhibitions, maintaining the original layout of the spaces but only adapting the door openings to the new requirements and routes.
All the passages between the various rooms will be defined and emphasised by covering the shoulders of the door compartments with painted steel sheet metal frames.
The connection between the floors provides the removal of the existing central staircase built during the redevelopment of the building in the 1960s, lacking in aesthetic and historical value and in dissonance with the building's architectural features, and the construction of a new, more deflected concrete staircase in the west area of the building.
However, to leave a trace of the 20th century interventions the project provides for the preservation of the hole in the staircase in the floor between the ground and first floors and the enhancement through the creation of the central distribution gallery which characterises the exhibition route on the first floor.
La plant design (electrical, plumbing and fire protection) provided for a targeted placement of the infrastructures in such positions as to interfere as little as possible with the building structures and museum routes.
An internal humidity control system has also been planned and will be implemented and put into operation in the case of special fittings.
The restoration project of the external façades envisages the conservation and recovery of all the elements with the intention of preserving their material and aesthetic characteristics as much as possible. The plastered surfaces of the south, east and west façades and the colonnade of the portico are to be restored, any decohered portions are to be consolidated and plastered, and paintings are to be added. In addition, they will be restored stone elements of the façade (soft Vicenza stone cornices, decorations, cornices), the window sills and gratings, the wooden entrance door, the window frames on all fronts by restoring and reinforcing the wooden frame and replacing the opening hardware and glass with new laminated glass for better thermal and shatterproof sealing, the shutters on the south front and replacing those on the other fronts.
They will be Selicions recovered trachyte slabs defining the porch floor by removing them after numbering the elements, preparing a suitable survey of the position of the individual ashlars, cleaning the surface, consolidating the decayed parts if necessary, and laying them again. It is also planned to remove the cement plaster on the north façade, which is of a different composition than that of the other façades and particularly deteriorated, and to replace it with a new face that will be made of coccio pesto for the base strip up to the height of one metre and lime-based for the remaining part up to the top, and to modify the phorometry of the north façade on the first and second floors, corresponding to the window holes of the bathrooms, heavily modified over time with the insertion of new openings, in order to restore the alignment with the ground floor holes and the formal balance of the entire façade;
The project envisages also the enhancement of spaces outside the Palace on the north side, of connection with the minor buildinge (former home of the Justice of the Peace), which will also be restored with a series of works to prepare the rooms as auxiliary museum rooms, supporting the museum set up in the Palace.
