Valentino Castle North Wing: A Study of a Documentation-Oriented HBIM Framework

Valentino Castle, a UNESCO World Heritage site and the core educational venue for Politecnico di Torino's Architecture and Design department, is pivotal for research and studies in different domains. The field of architectural heritage conservation and research on Valentino Castle has developed a series of profound study results and comprehensive archival records. Facing these data complexity and environmental degradation, a digital documentation system is vital. It consolidates historical findings and supports the castle's upkeep strategies. Heritage Building Information Modeling (HBIM) stands out in cultural heritage preservation, merging geometric and semantic data for historical analysis, monitoring, and interventions. It boosts information management efficiency and responds to environmental shifts. However, HBIM's application in heritage projects needs better standardization and archival clarity. Addressing the issues, this study delineates a methodological approach oriented towards archival HBIM, aimed at effective digital documentation and management of Valentino Castle via HBIM technology. In contrast to the prevalent HBIM workflows driven by heritage conservation and intervention - such as typical scan-to-BIM projects - this documentation-oriented HBIM workflow can reduce the impact of the metric survey phase. Instead, it utilizes a variety of pre-existing geometric data, including both detailed point clouds as well as traditional drawings, to expedite and simplify the construction of 3D geometric models, thereby facilitating more efficient management of heterogeneous data. Consequently, this approach avoids the exclusive reliance on high-fidelity point cloud acquisition or intricate geometric modeling, instead emphasizing the development of comprehensive documentation standards and the strengthening of information management infrastructures. The methodology is partitioned into four distinct phases, each following the previous in a logical sequence, thereby ensuring a seamless execution of the project. It begins by establishing a standardized research framework and workflow paradigm, providing a reference and comparison for specific project workflows to assess the completeness of the project framework and identify any omitted steps. Subsequently, detailed methods for geometric simplification modeling are formulated for different architectural elements, combining building construction knowledge with HBIM technology. The third, for the semantic and heterogeneous information of the north wing of Valentino Castle, the study introduces a four-tier information framework - Level 1: Building, Level 2: Zone, Level 3: Components A, Level 4: Components B - to manage the information of different types and objects within the project. It establishes external database and table management methods based on this framework. Lastly, the study evaluates the implementation efficiency of HBIM using the Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) platform to enhance information interoperability, thereby achieving a broader multi-disciplinary research environment. The documentation-oriented HBIM system methodology proposed in this study has been implemented and validated in the north wing project of Valentino Castle, achieving preliminary HBIMD work. Moreover, this methodology provides methodological references for other architectural heritage documentation projects with similar objectives, promoting the digitalization process of architectural heritage projects.