The concept of Heritage

The relationship between history and design is explored through an examination of the concept of heritage, both etymologically and in the many forms it can take in various fields of knowledge, from law to culture and testimony, as well as in terms of value, which connects it to the notion of tradition. Tradition should not be understood in a conservative or romantic sense but should be seen as a living legacy and a necessary heritage to be used actively and intentionally in an architectural project that is cultured, appropriate and sensible in order to look further ahead, standing on the shoulders of giants, as Bernard of Chartres teaches us. The ‘social object’ that, according to philosopher Maurizio Ferraris, characterises the artefact ‘architecture’ becomes, with reference to heritage and using the notion of ‘hyperobject’ proposed by Graham Harman and Timothy Morton, a true ‘hypersocial object’, collective and shared, part of the collective memory to be preserved in an unconventional or merely protective manner. In this transformative interpretation, the architectural project is called upon to renew the heritage received and recognised in order to finally make history, seen as the ‘terrain of choices’ and the past that it investigates à la Faulkner as ‘the visible part of the future’.