The future of the past: values and transformations of a public modern building. The Genoa fish market.

The paper explains a possible methodology finalized to an appropriate conservation process applied to one of the first rationalist building in Genoa: the “fish market”. Designed in 1933 by the technicians of the Office of Public Works of Genoa, the building represents a case of Genoese modern architecture and a witness of the role of the Municipality in the architectural renewal of the city, since it was built during the transition period from the consolidate use of the historicist styles to the adoption of the modern rationalist standards. Assuming that the current configuration of the building is the result of many transformations occurred, between the Fifties and the Seventies, due to functional causes and urban transformations, the fish market, by the time, also became a testimony of the evolution of the Modern city. All these historical and architectural values are, nowadays, at risk of disappearing, due to the decision of the Municipality to build a new fish market in a different location. To save the building from a possible abandonment, a strategy of re-use is thus required, based on a deep knowledge of its layered history, current consistency and state of conservation. Such a strategy should pay attention not only to the future developments, but also to the management of the building in the period that separates us from future interventions. In fact, as often happens, due to the lack of maintenance activities and to different problems that are delaying a plan of re-use of the building, every day the conservation state of the fish market increasingly worsens. Taking advantage from the most recent digital tools applied to heritage conservation practices, the paper illustrates an attempt to create an instrument that allows the documentation of the past configurations of the building, as well as its continually evolving consistency and state of conservation. Furthermore, as a planning instrument, it could support the planning of maintenance activities and the management of future developments.