Architectural History and Digital Technologies: Narrative Potential and Epistemological Challenges

In recent years, architectural and urban historians have increasingly embraced digital tools, from big data management to Historical Building Information Modeling (HBIM). Initially employed for visualization, digitalization has evolved into an essential research tool. In cases where buildings or sections of cities no longer exist, 3D models have become crucial to the research process, allowing the integration of archival sources with other types of documentation (visual, material, etc.), and enabling the creation and comparison of alternative reconstruction hypotheses within a framework of continuous updating and sharing of data (‘open data’ and ‘open science’). This is an inherently interdisciplinary type of research where languages, heuristic processes, and protocols from different disciplinary fields (e.g., computer science, data visualization, architectural restoration, etc.) must dialogue and operate on a common platform. The use of tools from different disciplines can only be effective under two conditions: the sharing of aligned objectives and the pursuit of research questions that can be answered through methodological experimentation. These principles underpin the 2022 PRIN-funded research project “CoenoBI(u)M. Art and architecture of the Cassinese Benedictine Congregation (XV-XVIII centuries): digital and spatial analysis strategies through BIM models”. Here, the need to study the architecture of an entire network of monasteries to identify their shared features has necessitated an interdisciplinary approach and innovative applications of digital modeling.